Parliamentary Speeches

Mr. Speaker, this summer, as chair of the Conservative task force on property rights, I travelled B.C., meeting with homeowners, farmers, business owners and industry leaders. Their message was clear. They are worried that the private property security they once took for granted is being eroded. Property rights are a cornerstone of a free and prosperous society. They give families the confidence to build a future and businesses the certainty to invest, grow and create jobs. However, through a series of misguided decisions, David Eby's NDP government and the Liberals here in Ottawa have created uncertainty where there should be security, and anxiety where there should be confidence. Only Conservatives are speaking clearly for the principle that what Canadians earn, invest in and own deserves the full protection of the law, because protecting property rights means protecting both prosperity and freedom.

Mr. Speaker, it is great to be back in the House of Commons after a very busy summer at home in my riding of Langley Township—Fraser Heights and throughout British Columbia. Like every member of the House, I am sure, I heard from many Canadians about their concerns about the state of Canada's economy, so I would like to start with this: Conservatives are focused on saving Canadians money. Liberals are all talk and no results. Liberals are costing Canadians more. They are out of touch, and Canadians are out of money. The Conservative plan, on the other hand, restores the promise of an affordable, safe and independent Canada. It will save people money. It will save Canadian jobs. It will keep people safe. It will fix immigration, and it will put Canada first, always. As I was speaking with people throughout British Columbia, I also heard deep concerns about the economic uncertainty that has arisen under the Cowichan Tribes decision, which, for the first time in Canadian history, declared aboriginal title over fee simple lands. Somehow those two competing interests have to live with each other, and that brings me to the topic of the day: Bill C-10, an act respecting the commissioner for modern treaty implementation. Let me start with this. Conservatives agree with the importance of modern treaties. Treaties are the way forward for Canada. Treaties create certainty. Treaties provide clarity. Treaties are better than endless litigation. Well-negotiated treaties can reconcile indigenous rights, support economic development and provide stable foundations for future generations. Canada continues to grapple with one of the unfinished chapters of Confederation, unresolved indigenous land claims, and nowhere is this more true than in British Columbia, my home province. This summer, as chair of the Conservative Party task force on property rights, I travelled around British Columbia with colleagues, and we met with realtors, bankers, appraisers, ranchers, builders, business owners, indigenous leaders and ordinary Canadian homeowners. I wanted to hear their concerns following the British Columbia Supreme Court decision in the Cowichan Tribes case. As I said, for the first time in Canadian history, aboriginal title has now been declared over privately held lands. The judge in that court case said that the indefeasible title provisions of the British Columbia Land Title Act do not apply to aboriginal title when it is declared over private lands. This is a seismic shift in thinking about private ownership, about private lands. This goes to the very foundation of our modern western economy. Whether one disagrees or agrees with the legal reasoning in that decision, there is no disputing that it has generated significant uncertainty across many sectors in Canada's economy. We heard concerns about mortgage lending and financing. We heard concerns about real estate valuation and investment. We heard concerns about investment decisions. We heard concerns about municipal tax bases and economic development. One real estate property appraiser described the situation this way: He said that, historically, appraisers could rely on the indefeasibility provisions of the land title office to confirm the ownership and determine exactly what interest was being valued. However, after the Cowichan decision, appraisal firms are increasingly inserting disclaimers related to aboriginal title claims. They are putting it right into their report, saying that they assume there are no aboriginal title claims on the property. Well, that goes to the value of the property and undermines certainty. It undermines confidence in our economy. Certainty matters. People buying homes need certainty. Businesses making investment decisions need certainty. Indigenous communities seeking economic development and opportunities also require certainty. Municipalities planning for the future need certainty. As one business leader at one of our round table meetings put it, if we have no certainty in Canada, we have no Canada. I would agree with that. We need to know where we are, going forward. One of our meetings was in Victoria, British Columbia. My colleagues and I met with leaders from the Cowichan tribes, the plaintiffs in the litigation. We had a great meeting. We certainly did not agree on everything, but we agreed on one very important point: The treaty-making process in British Columbia has not adequately resolved these questions for either indigenous or non-indigenous communities. One of the chiefs made an observation that has stayed with me. She described the treaty-making process and the settlement of land claims as the unfinished work of Canada's Confederation, and I agree with that. When British Columbia entered Confederation in 1871, Canada promised to connect the province to the rest of the country with a transcontinental railroad. As settlement expanded westward through Ontario and the Prairies, the federal government negotiated what we call today the numbered treaties, covering most of Ontario, all of the provinces, and even the northeastern section of British Columbia. These treaties facilitated settlement, established a relationship with indigenous communities, provided for certainty as the country grew, and facilitated development and even the railroad. However, when Canada reached the Rocky Mountains, the process largely stopped. Apart from the Douglas treaties in the southern part of Vancouver Island around Victoria and Treaty 8 in the northeast, as I already mentioned, most of British Columbia was left outside the treaty system. The result is that British Columbia remains unique in Canada. Most of the province was never covered by historic treaties. This unresolved reality has shaped decades of litigation and important court cases, all of them originating in my home province: from the Calder decision to the Delgamuukw decision, the Tsilhqot'in decision and most recently the Cowichan decision. Today, most of British Columbia's 204 identified first nations have unresolved claims. There are similar unresolved claims in other parts of Canada as well, such as in the Ottawa Valley, in the Maritimes and in some parts of Quebec, but British Columbia stands out as having a real lack of modern treaties. That is why we say modern treaties are so important. We support them. Negotiated treaties are better than litigation. Clear treaties are better than uncertainty. Final settlements are better than decades of court battles. In fact, many of the constituents I heard from this summer reinforce that very point. The answer to uncertainty is not more uncertainty. The answer is clearer agreements: treaties that define rights, responsibilities and expectations. That brings me to the topic of the day, Bill C-10. Many Canadians hearing about this legislation might reasonably assume that it is designed to accelerate treaty negotiations, settle outstanding claims or help complete the unfinished work of treaty making in Canada. Unfortunately, that is not what the bill would do. Bill C-10 would primarily create a new commissioner and a new institution to oversee the implementation of existing treaties. That work was already being done very effectively by the Office of the Auditor General, but the Liberal government simply chose to ignore those reports. How would this be different with the new treaty commissioner? The problem is not that Canada is suffering from a shortage of commissioners. It is suffering from a shortage of action and results. The Liberals' response to many problems is to create a new office, another agency, another commissioner or another layer of bureaucracy. Permits are being held up, so they create a Major Projects Office. Housing is unaffordable, so they create another office, another bureaucracy for housing that is going to overlook the previous commissions that were not doing their job. If treaty implementation is falling behind, the Liberals say to create another commission. I am saying that the appearance of action is not action itself. We already have the Auditor General's office for that work. The answer is to do the work. Reconciliation cannot be measured by how many commissions there are. It must be measured by outcomes. Canada needs a serious plan to complete the unfinished work of reconciliation and treaty making. Reconciliation and certainty are not competing goals; they are complementary goals. Indeed, the best treaties in history have advanced both. Unfortunately, Bill C-10 would do very little. We do not need more commissions. We need action.

Mr. Speaker, we are absolutely supporting the modern treaty process. We underline how important it is. We underline that treaties are better than endless litigation, which we are seeing in British Columbia. I would just add that the government has mismanaged the litigation file seriously, just as it was mismanaging the treaty implementation. The Auditor General has reported on it numerous times. Why do the Liberals not just fill the deficiencies, roll up their sleeves and get the job done?

Mr. Speaker, British Columbia is unique in that most of the territory is not covered by treaties, unlike Ontario, for example. However, there are areas, including my colleague's riding, where treaties have not been negotiated, so this is a Canada-wide problem. The uncertainty arising out of the litigation around property rights is undermining Canadians' confidence in one of the pillars of our economy: private property rights. It must be resolved.

Mr. Speaker, indeed there are a lot of gaps in Bill C-10. As a matter of fact, we are saying that the commissioner is not necessary. It would just be another layer of bureaucracy. We already have the Auditor General's office, which has been reporting on government deficiencies in implementing the modern treaties, but rather than admit that it has mismanaged the file, in typical Liberal fashion the government has just made another announcement about another organization that is finally going to solve the problems. I remain unconvinced that this is going to happen. What we need is for the government to roll up its sleeves, get the job done and get it done now.

Mr. Speaker, in Cowichan Tribes v. the Attorney General of Canada, the B.C. Supreme Court declared aboriginal title over private lands, and the private landowners, 150 of them, are worried. It has been well documented that the Liberals directed their federal lawyers to drop arguments protecting private property rights, to pull their punches and allow aboriginal title to take precedence. Where are the results for private landowners?

Mr. Speaker, the reality is that the appeal process in British Columbia is going to take years. In the meantime, homeowners in Richmond, British Columbia, and throughout the province are feeling insecure. Here is the reality in the subject territory in Richmond. Realtors are not taking listings, appraisers are devaluing property values and bankers are not lending money on title that they see as insecure. My question again is this: Where was the federal government to stand up for private property rights?

Madam Speaker, earlier in debate tonight, we heard from the Liberal side of the House suggesting that anybody who was opposed to Bill C‑22 was fearmongering and spreading misinformation. However, the very rational debate coming from the member for Vancouver East would suggest otherwise. Also, I am reading a Global News story that says that social media platforms, satellite companies and telecommunication companies will consider leaving Canada if and when Bill C‑22 passes because they are afraid they are not going to be able to maintain their customers' privacy, something that they are committed to doing. The secondary concern of these companies seems to be the additional cost of having to maintain digital information for a long period of time. Can the member for Vancouver East comment on those very rational concerns?

Mr. Speaker, while the high-flying Prime Minister is racking up a $1-million debt for luxury inflight catering, many Canadians are struggling just to put food on the table. There were 2.2 million Canadians who went to a food bank in one month last year alone, but the Prime Minister is living the high life, even though he is leading the only G20 country into a recession. Will the Prime Minister reverse his failed policies that are causing this food affordability crisis so that Canadians can afford to live again?

Mr. Speaker, I thank the minister for her speech on this self-government agreement, which she says could inform future agreements. There is the Musqueam recognition rights agreement in Vancouver, which has become very controversial. It says that it is not a land agreement, and it goes on to add some comfort that nothing in this agreement is going to impact any aboriginal rights. What is missing is some comfort for the other party, the three million people in Vancouver, who are worried about private property rights. Perhaps it could say something like, “the protection and inalienability of fee simple property rights for all Canadians”. Would that be an improvement?

Mr. Speaker, earlier in the debate today, we heard the minister say that this agreement is a model to inform future treaties, yet the most recent treaty, the K'ómoks Treaty, which my colleague also mentioned, introduces the concept of UNDRIP, a foreign document. This is not made in Canada. Could my colleague comment on how important it is for Canada to stick to made-in-Canada solutions when we are drafting our treaties?

Madam Speaker, the Liberal government is going to be adding somewhere between $70 billion and $80 billion in additional debt to its already sky-high deficit with accumulated debt of over $1 trillion. If I take the middle point and apply 4% interest to it, that is $3 billion every year just in additional interest payments on an already very high number. How does the Liberal government justify adding tens of billions of dollars of debt to the national debt when so many Canadians are already struggling with the cost of living?

Mr. Speaker, I am speaking to the Conservative motion that is on the agenda today, which is calling on the Liberal government to put private property first in the Cowichan case, arguing that private property has priority over all other forms of title. We are saying this because the Cowichan Tribes v. Canada decision created massive uncertainty around fee simple property, the legal basis on which Canadians and businesses alike own their homes and their lands, and I could add their warehouses, their factories, their hotels and their high-rise apartment buildings. I want to quote from the B.C. Supreme Court decision that has shaken the confidence of the real estate market, homeowners and landowners. This is what the judge says at paragraph 2193: I agree that Aboriginal title is a prior and senior right to land. It is not an estate granted by the Crown, but rooted in prior occupation. It is constitutionally protected. The question of what remains of Aboriginal title after the granting of fee simple title to the same lands should be reversed. The proper question is: what remains of fee simple title after Aboriginal title is recognized in the same lands? This is what is unsettling so many people interested in real estate. What does “a prior and senior right” actually mean? Here is another quote, from paragraph 3551, which is close to the end of the 800-page decision. The judge says, “A precedent that will follow from this case is that provincial Crown grants of fee simple interest do not extinguish nor permanently displace Aboriginal title, and ss. 23 and 25 of the [British Columbia Land Title Act] do not apply to Aboriginal title.” Before entering Parliament as a member of Parliament in 2019, I spent many years practising corporate, real estate and land development law in the metro Vancouver area. Those decades in law taught me this with absolute clarity: Canada's economic stability rests on the bedrock of secure, indefeasible fee simple title. This principle, inherited from centuries of British common law development, is not an abstract legal doctrine. It is a foundation of our banking system, commercial investment, housing markets and, importantly, the ability of ordinary Canadians to build and preserve wealth. If we undermine that foundation, we undermine our economic stability and civic resilience as a Canadian society. The whole real estate industry banks on indefeasibility, the principle that says that when a person is registered as the legal owner of the land, their ownership cannot be challenged or defeated. The title is what the title says it is. Nobody had ever questioned the simple principle of indefeasibility until the Cowichan decision last year. One phrase bears repeating: “[Sections] 23 and 25 of the [Land Title Act] do not apply to Aboriginal title.” I am not trying to get technical, but these are the sections that underpin the principle of title indefeasibility. Today that principle is less secure than we always thought it was. This is the first in Canadian jurisprudence. There have been other cases in British Columbia where the courts ruled that a first nation had met all the criteria for proving aboriginal title. The first one was a 1997 Supreme Court of Canada case called Delgamuukw, which set out the standard for proving aboriginal title in the court of law. There was another important case, 17 years later, called the Tsilhqot’in Nation case, which declared aboriginal title over a large but remote area of British Columbia of about 2,000 square kilometres. All the land in question was Crown land. The Tsilhqot’in Nation was the plaintiff in that case. Its litigation strategy was deliberately crafted to avoid conflict with private property owners. Let us fast-forward another decade to the case we are talking about today, which declared aboriginal title over a relatively small area of only 800 acres compared to the 2,000 square kilometres in the Tsilhqot’in case. However, this land is right in the heart of metro Vancouver. Any realtor will tell us that the three most important things about real estate are location, location and location. The location in question makes the real estate very valuable. It is right in the heart of an industrial part and residential part of metro Vancouver. There are about 150 private landowners. There is a beautiful golf course. A significant landowner's project has now been put on hold. None of them had the opportunity to argue their case in court. The fact that the Cowichan plaintiffs did not restrict their claim to publicly owned lands but included privately owned lands makes this case unique. It is in that context that we accuse the Liberals of dropping the ball. A different and more far-reaching strategy on the part of the plaintiffs, compared to the Tsilhqot’in, who restricted their claim to public lands, required a different and more aggressive response from the federal Attorney General lawyers. Under the direction of the Attorney General in 2018, the justice department lawyers pulled their punches. At paragraph 2096 the judge noted, “Canada initially [argued] extinguishment but abandoned its reliance on this defence in its amended response to [the] civil claim filed November 22, 2018”, obviously in direct response to new directives coming from the Attorney General. They dropped the ball. They dropped their first and best line of defence, which says that the clear and simple act of the Crown's granting fee simple title to individuals throughout B.C.'s history had the effect of extinguishing aboriginal title, to the extent that future plaintiffs might argue for aboriginal title. We are saying that it is obvious that the government lawyers should have maintained this line of defence, considering the aggressive action by the Cowichan plaintiffs. An aggressive offence demands an aggressive defence. Some people argue that weakening private property rights is a path toward reconciliation, but Canadian courts have already warned of the opposite. In the New Brunswick case of J.D. Irving v. Wolastoqey Nation, December 2025, the Court of Appeal of New Brunswick put it this way: “a declaration of Aboriginal title over privately owned lands, which, by its very nature, gives the Aboriginal beneficiary exclusive possession, occupation, and use would sound the death knell of reconciliation with the interests of non-Aboriginal Canadians.” That is not rhetoric. It is a sober legal assessment of the consequences of eroding certainty in land ownership. The British Columbia Supreme Court, in the Cowichan decision, moved in the opposite direction. The court held that aboriginal title can extend to privately owned lands, and that aboriginal title and fee simple ownership can somehow coexist on the same land at the same time. In my respectful view, this is simply not possible. Both forms of title claim exclusive rights to occupy, to develop and to benefit economically from the land. Two competing exclusive titles cannot occupy the same legal space without destroying the certainty that underpins our entire property system. The result is not reconciliation; it is confusion. It is not economic opportunity; it is economic paralysis. It is not a path forward; it is a step backward into uncertainty at a moment when Canada desperately needs stability, investment and confidence. If the Cowichan decision stands as it is, the consequence will be profound. It risks chilling development, destabilizing markets and deepening divisions rather than healing them. Canada cannot afford a property rights regime that leaves homeowners, lenders and investors unsure if they can take their fee simple title to the bank. Reconciliation requires clarity, honesty, transparency and respect, not the erosion of the very legal foundations that allow our society to function. That is the principle that the Liberal government overlooked when it instructed its lawyers to not use all the tools in their tool box to defend property rights in Canada for Canadians. They dropped the ball, and Canadians are paying the price.

Mr. Speaker, if I had a half-hour or an hour, I would have talked about all the interesting cases, but I had only 10 minutes. The Haida case is obviously a very important case. It talks about and expands on the principle of the duty to consult. I will not argue with that. There is a duty to consult. We agree with that. We agree that reconciliation is important, but to undermine the private property regime that Canada's economy is built on is not the way forward on reconciliation.

Mr. Speaker, normally we would try to argue it in committee, but it got shut down. We have put forward a motion, a proposal, that the House form a committee to look at this issue. In the meantime, we need to argue it in the House. This is very important to Canadians. It is important to people in my riding and to people in metro Vancouver, because they are deeply concerned about the uncertainty being brought by this decision and by the lack of action by the federal government.

Mr. Speaker, we have heard on a number of occasions that the Liberals appealed the decision as soon as they could. That is just not true. They waited until literally the last minute to appeal it. More importantly, the Liberals say they stand for private property rights. However, they did not use all the tools in their tool box to do that. Even though private property owners have not been named as defendants, the Attorney General could and should have been there to defend private property owners, which he did not do.

Mr. Speaker, that is an interesting comment coming from a member who did not consult with the first nation communities in her riding when she asked to drop the indigenous name from the riding name. Yes, the Liberals today are saying that they will defend private property rights. However, they failed to do it before, and they have now worked themselves into a corner where they are not able to advance some of the arguments at the Court of Appeal that they should have raised at the trial level.

Mr. Speaker, that is a great question. Again, it was a short speech, and I did not have time to work everything into it. I have spoken to a number of the landowners, including a commercial landowner in the region who has a project under way. He had financing in place. He had tenants for the new warehouse complex he was going to build. All of it is on hold. The company is now making an application to the court, doing what the federal government and the Attorney General should have done during the trial many years ago. He is making an application to argue the rights of private property owners.

Mr. Speaker, the Liberals keep talking about misinformation as though the Conservatives, when we raise issues with or weaknesses in the Liberal Party, are spreading misinformation. All we are doing is shedding light on their incompetence. We have a real-life example in the Montrose application, which the minister has already mentioned. We talked to them. They had a project that was ready to go. It has fallen apart. This is not misinformation. This is the reality on the ground. It is not the Conservatives that are repeating this. These are the facts on the ground that are making life difficult for investors. Can the minister comment on that?

Mr. Speaker, I would like to thank my colleague from Quebec for her enlightening speech and for explaining the difference between “fee simple”, coming from British feudal law, and “absolute title”, coming from civil law. That was very enlightening. However, the same question still applies. Does the member think that absolute title and aboriginal title can coexist on the same piece of land at the same time, or is that an irreconcilable conflict?

Mr. Speaker, all morning, we on this side of the House have been raising some of the issues, some of the complexities, that have arisen from the Cowichan decision of the B.C. Supreme Court. It has been suggested by the Liberal side of the House that we are fearmongering or being misleading. I am very happy that the member opposite raised the issue of the Montrose application. He will be aware that Montrose had a land development project that has now run into complications on account of the Cowichan decision. This is not fearmongering. These are just facts. I wonder if he could comment about that.

Mr. Speaker, I thank my hon. colleague from Saanich—Gulf Islands for her very interesting speech and recap of some of British Columbia's history. I am also a history fan, so I have read the whole case and would confirm some of the things she said. The member is saying that Cowichan does not stand for the proposition that aboriginal title threatens fee simple title. The problem with that, of course, is that the Delgamuukw case said aboriginal title gives the holder thereof exclusive rights to possession, and fee simple does the same, so there cannot be the same thing on the same piece of land. I will also note that the Cowichan case was the first time in Canadian history, as far as I know, that a plaintiff first nation group claimed aboriginal title over privately held lands. The Tsilqhot'in case the member cited was only about public lands, so I would challenge her on saying that aboriginal title has no effect.

Mr. Speaker, 81 years ago today, on May 5, 1945, Canadian Forces finally secured the liberation of the Netherlands from Nazi occupation. It marked the end of a hard-fought campaign that began on D-Day in northern France, continued through a bitterly cold winter and brutal fighting along the Scheldt River, and concluded with the liberation of Arnhem and surrounding towns and cities. Victory came at the high cost of the lives of 7,600 Canadian soldiers. From that sacrifice emerged a deep and enduring friendship between Canada and the Netherlands. It led to a wave of Dutch immigration to Canada after the war, including my own parents, and it continues to be honoured on both sides of the Atlantic. Earlier today, we reflected that legacy with a simple yet elegant flag-raising ceremony here in Ottawa, celebrating the lasting bond between two freedom-loving democratic nations. May the friendship endure.

Mr. Speaker, the Prime Minister claims that the Liberal government protects private property rights and that it will appeal the Cowichan decision. Here is the problem: At trial, the Liberals dropped the argument that private property rights come first, making it easier for the trial judge to conclude that aboriginal title is a “prior and senior right to land.” How can the Prime Minister now say that the government will argue on appeal the very opposite, that private property rights come first, when they did not raise it at trial?

Mr. Speaker, my colleague from Edmonton Northwest talked quite a bit about the ambiguity in the treaty and how that ambiguity might lead to confusion between various Métis groups. I am wondering about the Métis Nation British Columbia. Yes, there is one, and it has jurisdiction over 30,000-plus Métis people. What assurances are there that this will not impact the very important work that they are doing in my home province?

Mr. Speaker, British Columbians are living with uncertainty about whether the homes they worked their whole lives to buy are truly theirs. Businesses are hearing from their commercial lenders that they cannot just assume that they can take their fee simple security to the bank. Between the Cowichan Tribes decision and the Musqueam agreements, Liberal and NDP governments have cast doubt on fee simple private property rights for thousands of Canadians. Reconciliation matters, but it cannot be pursued through legal confusion. The Cowichan case may take years to reach the Supreme Court of Canada, leaving families and businesses in limbo. The Liberals say they will appeal, but here is the problem: They had instructed their lawyers not to argue at trial that fee simple title supersedes all other titles and interests. Appeals are not do-overs, so how do they expect to win an appeal on arguments they are not entitled to raise? How are they going to restore confidence in home ownership and fee simple security, now that they have dropped the ball?

Mr. Speaker, last week I raised an issue of deep concern to the people of British Columbia, namely the impact of the B. C. Supreme Court decision in Cowichan Tribes v. Canada and the impact that the decision has on private property rights. It is a significant ruling, because it is the first time in Canada's history that a court declared aboriginal title over non-Crown lands, privately owned lands. There have been other aboriginal title cases in British Columbia before, and I am going to highlight one of them, the Tsilhqot’in Nation case of 2014. The court declared aboriginal title over a very large piece of land, 1,750 square kilometres. It was very remote land and it was all Crown land. The Tsilhqot'in plaintiffs in that case were very careful to carve around all the privately held land, so that the claims area was only public land. That was their strategy. Fast-forward a decade to the current case, and the Cowichan plaintiffs took a different, more aggressive approach. Their claims area does include privately owned lands. We are talking about a relatively small piece of land, not 1,750 square kilometres but 800 acres. It is right in the heart of Metro Vancouver and, as any realtor would say, the three most important things about real estate are "location, location, location". The morning after the decision, 150 private landowners, farmers, homeowners, businesses and a golf course discovered that their titles were now burdened with the aboriginal title designation. That is what makes this decision so unique. It has never happened before in Canadian history. This is why I say that the Liberals dropped the ball. Instead of arguing aggressively to defend private property rights, federal counsel, under the direction of then attorney general Jody Wilson-Raybould and then prime minister Justin Trudeau, retreated from their strongest legal defence. This is what the court said in paragraph 2096, “Canada initially pled extinguishment but abandoned its reliance on this defence in its amended response to civil claim filed November 22, 2018.” The Liberal strategy was to drop its first and best line of defence, that the Crown's deliberate granting of fee simple title to private individuals throughout British Columbia's history had the effect of extinguishing pre-existing aboriginal title. They did not argue that, making it easy for the trial judge to find that aboriginal title still exists on all parcels, including private lands, within the claim area, and that aboriginal title and privately held fee simple title could co-exist on the same piece of land. Many legal experts have weighed in on that, saying that it does not work, and asking how two title owners could have exclusive and competing interests over the same title. Who wins? The judge's answer was that “Aboriginal title is a prior and senior right” to other property interests, whether the land is public or private. That is what has people worried. Who actually owns the land? I will ask the question again. Will the new Liberal Prime Minister direct the federal lawyers to argue that private property rights in Canada must be secured for homeowners, farmers, businesses and investors?

Mr. Speaker, the concern is that the federal lawyers have dropped the extinguishment argument, which was their first and best line of defence, under the misguided concept or idea that reconciliation requires the federal government not to be too aggressive in defending private property rights. That is the concern here, and nothing that the hon. secretary has just mentioned adds any comfort. Of course the government is going to argue. Of course it is going to appeal, but is it going to argue that line of reasoning? There is a great quote from the New Brunswick Court of Appeal, which was addressing a similar fact situation. They said: ...a declaration of Aboriginal title over privately owned lands, which, by its very nature, gives the Aboriginal beneficiary exclusive possession, occupation, and use would sound the death knell of reconciliation with the interests of non-Aboriginal Canadians. Does he agree with that statement from the Court of Appeal?

Mr. Speaker, a couple of the amendments relate to actions of the longest ballot committee, and the bill is proposing to restrict the ability of pranksters, which I am going to call them, on the longest ballot committee to interfere with our election processes. One of the steps Conservatives are suggesting is prohibiting a person from signing nominations of more than one prospective candidate. Another one is a prohibition on acting as an official agent for more than one person in one riding. This came up at the procedure and House affairs committee, and one of the questions was whether it would withstand a charter challenge. Section 3 of the charter has been given a very broad interpretation to allow people to participate in the electoral district. I would ask for the member's comments on whether it would survive a charter challenge.

Mr. Speaker, my colleague from Ponoka—Didsbury's speech was inspiring. It is a pleasure serving with him on the committee that studied the bill. We know that a foreign influence registry is going to be set up. We have appointed a commissioner for that now. I wonder if my colleague could comment on how viable that commission will be now that we have a Prime Minister who is willing to enter into a security-sharing agreement with the police authorities in Beijing, a regime that at one time he said was an existential threat to Canada's security. How is that going to interplay with the foreign influence registry?

Mr. Speaker, I want to thank my colleague for his speech on Bill C-25, the strong and free elections act. He mentioned our former colleague, Kenny Chiu, who was elected at the same time as the two of us in 2019. He introduced a foreign influence registry private member's bill, something that the Liberal government should have done but failed to do. Madam Justice Hogue noted in her report that this was one of the reasons why Mr. Chiu may have lost his election, because of the foreign interference that followed, in the Chinese language on social media to people in his riding, criticizing him unfairly for introducing this private member's bill. I wonder if my colleague could comment on that.

Mr. Speaker, today we are debating the strong and free elections act, Bill C-25, the government's response to several recent developments, both local and international, that have challenged the integrity of and public confidence in one of our most important democratic institutions, our elections. After the 2021 election, the federal government appointed the Hon. Marie-Josée Hogue as commissioner for the Public Inquiry Into Foreign Interference in Federal Electoral Processes and Democratic Institutions. It is a very long name and also a very long report of seven or eight volumes. The commissioner's final report came out on January 28, 2025, about 14 months ago. I am going to read a couple of quotations from the report because they set the context for what this proposed legislation is all about. This is what she had to say at page 3 of her report: The first observation I would like to make from the evidence is that it is true that some foreign states are trying to interfere in our democratic institutions, including electoral processes. This is nothing new and comes as no surprise—states have been trying to interfere with each other’s business since time immemorial. What is new, however, is the means deployed by these states, the apparent scale of the issue and the public discourse on the topic. Members can think about it. We have been talking about AI. We have been talking about the influence of social media on people and the ease of spreading misinformation and disinformation. All of that is affecting our democratic institutions. Today, we were talking about our Canada Elections Act. In anticipation of the commissioner's conclusion at the end of seven or eight volumes, she wrote this at page 15: “I have found no evidence that the overall result of any election has been swung by a foreign actor and have identified only a small number of individual ridings where foreign interference may have had some impact.” Reading between the lines, the report says that, with or without foreign interference in the 2019 election, we would have had a minority Liberal government under the leadership of then prime minister Trudeau, and we would have had the Conservatives being in the opposition with the member for Regina—Qu'Appelle, who was the leader of the Conservative Party, as the Leader of the Opposition. That would have been the result, and I believe that is what Madam Justice Hogue meant by saying that she saw no impact on the overall result of that election. It was the same in 2021. With or without foreign interference in Canada's 2021 general election, we were going to have the Liberal minority government under then prime minister Justin Trudeau, and the Conservative opposition, with Erin O'Toole as the Leader of the Opposition. I accept Justice Hogue's findings that, in those two elections, Canadians got both the government and the opposition that they chose, but I note that her report also says this, which is highly important in the debate going on today: “I...have identified only a small number of individual ridings where foreign interference may have had some impact.” Therefore, at the macro level, Canadians got the government they chose, but at the local level, maybe they did not get the MP that the majority of people had actually wanted due to foreign interference in our electoral system. That is what we take out of this report. Justice Hogue drills down and looks at the riding of Steveston—Richmond East. We were talking about that just a couple of minutes ago in debate. This is what the Hogue report says at page 33: “In 2021, Mr. Chiu, the Conservative Party MP for Steveston—Richmond East, was the target of false narratives related to his proposal to implement a foreign influence registry.” If I have some time at the end, I will talk a bit more about the history behind the foreign influence registry, but for now, I am just going to continue with the Hogue report. It goes on to note that Mr. Chiu and the Conservative Party of Canada requested, very shortly after the election, that these issues be brought to CSIS. CSIS took on the investigation, but it did not get back to Mr. Chiu and the Conservative Party until almost two years later in the fall of 2023, and then only after media reporting about alleged leaks of the CSIS intelligence report. CSIS dropped the ball. Did it do good work? It probably did, but it was just too late. It was delayed, and it did not keep Mr. Chiu and his party in the loop. However, this story is not primarily about Mr. Chiu, my friend and colleague, and it is not primarily about the people of Steveston—Richmond East, although they are obviously players in the whole story. This is a story about the Canadian public and our confidence, or lack thereof, in our electoral system. Justice Hogue did not pull any punches when criticizing the government's slow and inadequate response to these allegations. She stated, “I could not fulfill my mandate to help build public confidence in our democratic institutions if I minimized the ways in which efforts have come up short.” She was very critical of the government. She went on to list some of these shortfalls. There was slow reaction to issues that were very urgent and very serious and should have been given a much higher level of attention. There was the failure to get information to the right decision-makers and policy-makers, and when the information finally did get to those decision-makers and policy-makers, they did not know what to do with it. They did not appreciate the seriousness of it. This was obviously under the guidance and inspiration of the Liberal government that, at that time, was not taking foreign interference as a serious issue. Also, there was a lack of coordination. There was confusion about the roles and accountabilities. However, in the end, she summed it up with rather a positive tone. She said, “However, on the whole, I am satisfied that the government now appreciates the foreign interference threat that Canada faces and is serious about responding to it.” It was 15 months ago that Justice Hogue wrote that, and here we are, finally, in the next Parliament, acting on it with the proposed strong and free elections act. It is a step in the right direction. We are going to support it to go to committee where I look forward to drilling down to see that it truly answers the legitimate concerns that have been raised in this report that Canadians have about the integrity of our democratic institutions. Here is one more quote from the Hogue report that I think sums it up nicely: Foreign interference—and our fear of foreign interference—has taken its toll. For some, their faith in our system has been challenged. I hope that for those who take the time to read this report, what they learn—what I have learned—will not only enhance their understanding of the foreign interference threat but also go some distance in rebuilding the confidence and trust in our democracy. I hope indeed that Bill C-25 will do exactly that, and that it will go some distance in rebuilding the lagging confidence that so many Canadians have in our democratic institutions. I would note that, in the last election, the voter turnout of younger people increased, and so that is a reason for optimism. A larger number of first-time voters came out, and once people vote the first time, they are probably going to vote in subsequent elections. Perhaps that curve is going in the right direction. However, unfortunately, overall, election turnout has not been particularly good. How much of that is tied to Canadians' skepticism about the integrity of our electoral system? I mentioned at the beginning of my remarks that the bill before us is a response not only to international affairs, which I think I talked about quite adequately, but also some local issues that have developed right here in Canada. In the last few general elections and by-elections, a group of local troublemakers or pranksters have interfered with our elections. They call themselves the “longest ballot committee”. We have all heard of their tactics, most recently in the by-election in Terrebonne. They find loopholes in our election act that allow them to nominate large numbers of people, sometimes in the hundreds, to run in a specific riding. They present themselves as being on a noble quest of wanting to initiate a citizens' forum, as they call it, to review our age-old first-past-the-post electoral system, which they do not like. They found a number of loopholes. One of the participants actually appeared as a witness at the procedure and House affairs committee a couple of months ago. What they have discovered is that, under the current Canada Elections Act, they can have the same 100 people sign 100 or even 200 nomination forms, nominating 200 different people. They can have the same person acting as a financial agent for all 200 or 100 or however many people they manage to get on the ballot. We want to shut that down. We are saying that this is inappropriate. I want to go back to their comments about wanting a citizens' forum. I can say that, being a British Columbian, I have some experience with that. We have had quite a lot of experience with citizens' forums and citizens' institutions. Over the years, I think we have had two or three of them. These were groups of responsible people coming together, appointed by the government, to have an intelligent and high-level discussion to review our electoral system, and to possibly come up with options with regard to the first-past-the-post system, which, over the years, has been challenged many times. The citizens' forum put the options to the voters in British Columbia on at least two occasions. Both times, citizens, after looking at it, studying it, trying their best to understand how the different options would work, said that they were comfortable with the first-past-the-post system and that they wanted to keep it. The pranksters behind the longest ballot committee are very aware of this history. We put it to them. They know it. They knew that if they were to go through that process again, a rational process, a legal process supported by the government, they would be unsuccessful. They thought they would try something else, guerrilla war tactics, instead. That is what they are doing. They are not serious. They know that they will not succeed. They know that this is nothing more than a stunt that is making people angry. They must be stopped. That is what the bill would do. I am happy to see that the drafters of the legislation have picked up the recommendations of the procedure and House affairs committee by implementing a couple of very important changes. There would now be a prohibition on a person signing nomination papers of more than one prospective candidate. There would be another prohibition on a person acting as an official agent for more than one candidate in the same electoral district. We looked at this very carefully. We listened to experts. We wanted to be as flexible as possible. We recognize that Canadians have a constitutional right, protected by section 3 in the charter, to be fully involved, in an unrestricted manner, in our electoral system. We want to encourage people to put their name forward and to be candidates. We want to encourage people to run as independents. One does not have to run for a political party. One does not need the endorsement of a party. Someone can just go out, be an independent candidate and get all their friends out to listen to them at the debate. This is all good for democracy. We did not want to stand in the way of that. We made this as permissive as possible, and I am happy to see that the government has actually picked up on this. We heard from legal experts that these restrictions are reasonable limitations on Canadians' charter-protected rights to participate fully in the democratic process. I agree that we need to put an end to the nonsense of the longest ballot committee. I also agree that these changes that we are proposing and which have found their way into Bill C-25 are reasonable and supportable. I want to send this to committee now for a further drill-down, to make sure that they actually would withstand the charter challenge and that they would provide the guidance that people need when they decide to get involved in the democratic process. I want to go back to my comments about the foreign influence registry. Our former colleague from Richmond East—Steveston introduced a private member's bill. I remember him asking why the government side of the House was not doing this. Many other western democracies have implemented and set up and authorized a foreign influence registry. It is not only China or Beijing but there are other countries as well that like to interfere in western democracies. Our trading nations, our fellow Westerners, have set up foreign influence registries. Why have we not done that? I believe it is because the Liberal government was not taking it seriously. It certainly was not at that time. Mr. Chiu took the brave step to introduce a private member's bill. I am going to go back to what Madam Justice Hogue said: In 2021, Mr. Chiu, the Conservative Party MP for Steveston-Richmond East, was the target of false narratives related to his proposal to implement a foreign influence registry. He was doing the work that the government should have been doing and he paid the price for it. I was very disappointed at the time. I still feel sad when I think about Mr. Chiu not being our colleague right now. I just want to underline that this bill is a step in the right direction. Much of it is supportable. In some things, it does not go far enough. In some things, I think it requires a further drill-down at the committee to ensure the proposals are actually going to meet their objectives. Certainly, we need to also hear from experts to ensure that it can withstand any sorts of challenges in court or challenges by people who want to find loopholes to get around them and find ways to interfere with our democratic institutions. That is what this bill is all about. We want to stop that. We want to support our democratic institutions. We want to support our free and fair elections. We want to ensure that Canadians are getting the government that they deserve and that they voted for. We want to ensure that Canadians are getting the local member of Parliament they want to choose and whom the majority are behind.

Mr. Speaker, I want to thank my next-door neighbour, the member for Mission—Matsqui—Abbotsford for a very thoughtful question. Indeed, there have been delays. The member asked me why the Liberal government has delayed that. I do not know. He would probably have to ask someone in of the Liberal government. I know he did not expect me to actually have an answer to that. However, this is the good news. We have now appointed Anton Boegman, the former chief electoral officer of British Columbia, to be the commissioner of the foreign influence registry. His job, number one, is now going to be to set up the registry. He came to our committee. We are optimistic that his appointment will actually be a meaningful one. However, my colleague raised a very interesting point. In light of the Prime Minister signing this security agreement with China, the greatest threat to our democracy, I wonder how effective the registry is actually going to be.

Mr. Speaker, the recent B.C. Supreme Court ruling in Cowichan Tribes calls into question whether private property rights in Canada are secure, creating unnecessary economic risk in our economy. Clearly the Liberals have dropped the ball on this one, and right at a time when Canadians are facing pressure from higher costs and economic uncertainty. Will the Liberal Prime Minister direct the lawyers to argue that private property rights in Canada must be secure for homeowners, farmers, businesses and investors? It must be number one.

Mr. Speaker, Bill C-13 is the bill by which the United Kingdom will be brought into the Comprehensive and Progressive Agreement for Trans-Pacific Partnership, or CPTPP. All of the other countries, and I believe there are 11 of them besides Canada, accept beef imports and pork imports from Canada, yet the United Kingdom is putting up non-tariff barriers to that. I wonder if the member could comment on that. Was that an oversight on the part of the Canadian negotiating team?

Mr. Speaker, I agree with my colleague from Peace River—Westlock that Alberta grain-fed beef is the best in the world. I love our friends from Great Britain, and I want them to benefit from Alberta grain-fed beef, but here is another thing. I love people from Ontario, and I want them to benefit from the best wine in Canada, British Columbia wine. I know it is not the topic of the day, but can my friend comment on the importance of British Columbia wine in LCBO stores?

Mr. Speaker, Bill C-13 is about bringing the United Kingdom into the comprehensive trade agreement with the Pacific. The member for Courtenay—Alberni mentioned frozen pensions for U.K. pensioners who decide to retire here in Canada. It seems deeply unfair, particularly since the U.K. does not do that for other countries like the United States. As a matter of fact, it seems to be picking on Commonwealth countries. This agreement seems like the perfect opportunity to resolve that problem, yet the Prime Minister has failed to do that. I would like to hear the member's comments on what that says about the Prime Minister's ability, or perhaps lack thereof, to negotiate good deals for Canada.

Mr. Speaker, a couple of weeks ago, I had a round of questions in question period about Canada's housing affordability crisis hitting young people particularly hard. Normally, supply meets demand, which is just economics 101, but the current real estate market is in such a state of imbalance that the new homes that buyers want and can afford are just not being built. That was the basis of my question. I noted that despite demand, CMHC was reporting a reduction in new housing starts over the next few years. The response I received was that we should just support the Liberals' housing plans, which are the ones that have been missing the mark and causing all the problems in the first place. I was directed to Bill C-20, the Build Canada Homes act, which a couple of sitting days later I actually had the opportunity to speak to. I am not going to repeat that speech, but I will highlight a couple of quotes from Professor Friedrich Hayek, the 20th-century free market economist of the classical liberal tradition. I noted, and will note again, that the current Liberal Party has abandoned classical liberal economics and replaced it with central planning socialism. This is why I quoted Friedrich Hayek, because he spent a good part of his academic life attacking central planning socialism and pointing out its weaknesses. He said, “The beauty of the market lies in its ability to coordinate actions without requiring omniscience.” He also said, “No single mind can comprehend the complexity of modern economic activity—only a decentralized process can manage it.” The Liberals used to believe that, but they do not anymore. They have become central planning socialists. They think that they are, in the professor's words, the “omniscience” or the single mind that can comprehend the complexity of modern economic activity. They think that just one more little tweak or a little adjustment to our comprehensive plans, one new bureaucracy, and the problem will be solved and the market will start to behave the way they think it should behave. The Liberals have failed so far, and they will continue to fail until they understand that the best thing they can do is to just get out of the way of the free market and let the market decide how it is going to be. The answer is not another bureaucracy and not an over-regulated economy. It is just to let the market behave the way it should. Do they agree with that?

Mr. Speaker, if all that wishful thinking would actually solve the problem, we would not have a problem. I think the member will agree that we actually do face a housing affordability crisis. I just want to give a couple of examples of the government getting in the way. In a British Columbia setting, we have the provincial government chasing away investment dollars that drive the pre-sale market, which is one of the pillars of condo market financing. Number two is the national building code driving an aggressive green agenda that is not tied to economic reality. Third is the wild west in development cost charges by municipalities that is taking any profit away from builders. I was talking to one land developer who says that until there is a change in attitude, they are leaving their money in a GIC, which is much safer and returning a better profit these days.

Mr. Speaker, despite promising the fastest-growing economy in the G7, the Prime Minister has delivered the weakest. Today, we are the only country in the G7 with a shrinking economy and young people are paying the price. The generation that should be building up wealth for the future is instead falling further behind. Personal debt is at an all-time high. Savings are basically non-existent, and millennials are giving up hope. They want to know when the government will create a working economy so that they can have hope for a better future.

Mr. Speaker, I rise today to speak about a private member's bill sponsored by my good friend and colleague, the member for Kamloops—Shuswap—Central Rockies. It is a great piece of legislation that will amend the Corrections and Conditional Release Act with a focus on victims. It is a simple bill that will have a significant and positive impact on our justice system. Unlike other criminal bills, this one does not create a new crime or further define an existing crime. It does not create new penalties for something that already is illegal. It will have no impact on people who have been convicted of a crime and who are incarcerated. However, it will have a very big and positive impact on victims of crime. At the Standing Committee on Justice and Human Rights, when I served on that committee in the last Parliament, we conducted a study on victims of crime. We learned from many victims and their families that, from their perspective, Canada's criminal justice system feels more like a criminal system than a justice system. That is because the focus is on the criminal: Are they guilty? Do we have enough evidence to convict them in a court beyond a reasonable doubt? What would be the appropriate sentence if they are found guilty, or the appropriate release conditions? Underlying all of this, of course, is the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms and the legal right everybody has to be presumed innocent. That is all important stuff and nobody is arguing about that. We want a criminal justice system that is fair, balanced and in compliance with our charter, but in all of that, where are the innocent victims whose lives have been upended by the terrible acts of the convicted criminal? Too often the lives of the victims are a sideshow in our criminal justice system. They need to be more front and centre. We want justice after all, not just for the criminal and not just to put people away for public safety or for punishment. We want a true sense of justice for the innocent, so that they too feel that the justice system is working for them. That is why I am so pleased that my colleague, the member for Kamloops—Shuswap—Central Rockies, brought forward this private member's bill to amend the Corrections and Conditional Release Act focusing on victims. In his speech in this chamber a couple of months ago when this bill was first introduced, he shared a personal story about how a crime committed many years ago impacted him and his family, and to this day the impact is still felt. It never goes away. I am also very pleased that another colleague, the member for Oshawa, has seconded the bill. She too has a connection with this piece of legislation, because it was her predecessor, a member of Parliament, our friend and former colleague Colin Carrie, who introduced a similar private member's bill in the last Parliament. It was called Bill C-320. At that time, all the parties agreed it should go ahead and it almost made it over the finish line. It went through the first, second and third readings here. Then it went to the other place for the first and second readings. It then went to committee for third reading. The only thing that was left to do was royal proclamation. What happened to it? It died on the Order Paper when Prime Minister Trudeau prorogued Parliament early last year for the sole purpose of rescuing his faltering Liberal Party from falling over the cliff. I will have more on that some other day, because that is not what we are talking about today. We are now here in the 45th Parliament and again it appears we have all-party support for this common-sense Conservative bill that is going to have a real and positive impact on victims and their families. In preparing my talking points for my intervention today, I took the opportunity to read the speeches published in the Hansard that were delivered by other members of other parties. It looks like the Bloc Québécois will support it. That is great. We know the Liberals will support it. As a matter of fact, they like the bill so much that they have adopted the substance of it and have incorporated it into one of their bills, Bill C-16, which is a very large criminal justice bill that runs 166 pages. It is at the justice committee right now undergoing a very thorough review. It may come back here, but in the meantime, we are going to keep pushing my colleague's private member's bill. As an aside, I am feeling positive. We are seeing a lot of stealing of ideas in the current Parliament, with the Liberals adopting Conservative proposals and calling them their own, proposals that just a short while ago they were criticizing and scoffing at. Now I guess they have finally seen the light. Imitation is the highest form of admiration. I can tell members that it feels really good to be admired by the Liberal side of the House for a change. We do not get a lot of that. However, I do not want to make too much of this recent and probably very temporary sense of goodwill. The chamber is a very adversarial one after all. Let us just settle on this. This is good legislation, and we should push it through as quickly as we can. I am well into my speech and I realize I have not even said what the bill would do. I can do no better than to summarize with a sentence from the speech I referenced earlier from my friend, the member for Kamloops—Shuswap—Central Rockies. He said this on November 18, 2025: “Transparency and accountability are core principles of our democracy, and the bill we debate today seeks to enhance the application of these essential principles, specifically for the benefit of those victimized by crime.” This is a really good summary. What would the bill do? It seeks to amend the Corrections and Conditional Release Act to ensure that victims receive clear explanations about how an offender's eligibility and review dates for temporary absences, release or parole are determined. Victims and their families would be told not only when those dates will be but also the rationale behind why those dates have been chosen, because we believe transparency and accountability are core principles of our democracy. We have heard from victims of crime that Canada's criminal justice system feels deliberately opaque. They feel left in the dark. It does not have to be that way. We can do better. The bill is a small step in that direction. Let us expedite it through the House and the other place, and push Canada's criminal justice system another small step towards true justice for everyone, including victims of crime.

Mr. Speaker, I rise to speak to Bill C-20, a bill from the Liberal government to establish yet another federal Crown corporation, called Build Canada Homes, which would apparently finally find the solution to the economic woes in our housing sector that have stubbornly evaded solutions provided by existing federal bureaucracies. The stated purpose of Build Canada Homes is to “promote, support and develop the supply of affordable housing in Canada and to promote innovative and efficient building techniques in the housing construction sector in Canada”. I know that sounds optimistic. Let us test that claim, that aspirational statement, against reality. For 10 years, we have had a Liberal government that thinks it is smarter than the free market. We hear it again today, that the government has all the solutions to all the problems and that with enough central planning, it can make the market behave the way it thinks it should behave. In my years in Parliament, I have observed time and again that the Liberal government's politics are performative in nature. It wants to appear to be doing something about whatever the problem is that is being debated that day. If major projects are being held up because of federal bureaucracy, well, let it create a major projects office. If military procurement is a mess, let it set up a commission to look at why all the other commissions have not been doing their job. Now, in a situation of housing unaffordability and new houses not being built to keep up with demand, we have a new bureaucracy for that too: a new Crown corporation, in fact. Build Canada Homes, it will be called. Here is what Canadians will get out of this new corporation. First of all, it will create its own bureaucracy, a board of directors comprising eight to 10 people, a chairperson, a full-time CEO, all of whom will be on the federal payroll. Secondly, it will get into the business of building affordable homes, apparently. It is good timing, I say somewhat facetiously, just as the B.C. government is getting out of that line of business. The headline in the Vancouver Sun over the weekend, screaming on the front page, is “'A massive step back' for housing”, while David Eby is grappling with a stunning $13.8-billion operating deficit just three years after he inherited a surplus of $5 billion from the previous government. Another headline on the same topic reads, “Loss of provincial fund upends many affordable rental projects”. People are up in arms about this. They want to know what is going on. The provincial government has made all these promises, and now it is abandoning ship because it does not have the money to do it. Thirdly, this new, highly paid bureaucracy will analyze what is wrong with the current state of affairs in the housing sector and advise government as to what to do, how to tweak things. One of the first reports coming out of this agency, this Crown corporation, no doubt, will analyze the current housing market in Canada and why it is in such a state of imbalance, despite the existence of federal government bureaucracies and best intentions that were supposed to make things better. This is the fourth bureaucracy, now. We already have the Canada Lands Company. We have the Canada Mortgage and Housing Corporation. We have Housing, Infrastructure and Communities Canada. I would just point this out: If creating bureaucracies could solve the problem, we would not have a problem. Let us take a look at the track record of the current bureaucracies. According to CMHC's own recent housing market outlook for 2026, housing starts are heading in the wrong direction, despite all the announcements from the Liberals, below the target necessary to restore housing affordability. A quote from the report sums it up very nicely. It says, “New home construction is set to decline through 2028 as developers face high costs, weaker demand and more unsold homes.” Can members imagine this, in an economy where there are not enough homes? This is especially true in B.C, where, the report predicts, “Housing starts will continue to slow down in 2026, with a more significant decline...in 2027-2028.” We are headed in the wrong direction. The Canadian Home Builders' Association had this to say in its Q4 report from last year: “Setting new record lows in builder sentiment was the unfortunate theme for the [housing market index] in 2025.” Builders are losing faith in their ability to build homes in the current sector, the environment that the Liberals have created. Ontario and British Columbia unfortunately will “lead the way in terms of broad pessimism among single- and multi-family builders.” Yes, it is pessimistic. People want to buy or rent homes but lack the financial resources to buy. Builders are being pessimistic about their ability to meet the demand in face of high costs that drive sale prices beyond what the market can bear. There is a serious imbalance in our economy, in other words. As I was preparing my notes, I thought of the famous economist Friedrich Hayek, the free-market economist who spoke about this in his famous 1945 essay, “The Use of Knowledge in Society”. I will paraphrase it. I just want to highlight that Friedrich Hayek was of the classical liberal tradition of economics, the tradition that the Liberal Party of Canada used to follow until it abandoned all that and Liberals became central planning socialists. That is what they are today. I will go back to Friedrich Hayek, who had this to say: “The beauty of the market lies in its ability to coordinate actions without requiring omniscience.” He also said, “The fatal flaw of central planning is the assumption that someone knows enough to direct the use of resources efficiently.” Here is another quote, a third from Professor Hayek: “No single mind can comprehend the complexity of modern economic activity—only a decentralized process can manage it.” The Liberals do not believe that. They used to believe it, but they do not believe it anymore. They have now abandoned classical liberal tradition to adopt central planning socialism. Today they think they are the omniscience, the single mind that can comprehend the complexity of modern economic activity. That is all we need to know to understand why the Liberals are always so optimistic that their next government central planning agency is finally going to solve the problem. If it does not, then the next one will, and the next one after that. They are always optimistic and always dreaming, always with wishful thinking. If Liberal wishful thinking would build homes, Canada would have the most affordable, the most successful and the most balanced housing market in the world, but that is unfortunately not the case. People who expect that the bill would actually accelerate affordable housing construction in Canada will be disappointed. The bill is simply about setting up a new bureaucracy to keep an eye on the existing bureaucracies that have failed time and time again to solve our housing affordability crisis and our housing availability crisis. Young people particularly are paying the price for all this mismanagement. In closing, here is some free advice for the Liberals from the free-market Conservatives. We continue to adopt and follow free-market economics because that is the solution to our economic goals: Just get out of the way. What the Liberals have been doing for the last 10 years has not been working, and the newly repackaged commission, the newly repackaged and restructured bureaucracy, would not solve the problem either. We wish the Liberals would just get out of the way and let smart Canadians build homes to meet market demand.

Mr. Speaker, the question from my colleague from the Bloc Québécois was a thoughtful one. I live in a community that is highly urbanized, but parts of it are still rural, so I sympathize with the question. I will revert back to what I had said earlier, which is that the market generally sorts things out. If there is a demand in smaller communities, it will be filled if the government gets out of the way. Is there a role for government? Provincial and federal governments own a lot of land. Maybe they should put that out into the marketplace. I know there are areas in British Columbia that would benefit greatly from the release of federal lands from federal control. Put it into private enterprise and let us build.

Mr. Speaker, that is an important question, but I am really the wrong person to be asking it to. Trying to get into the minds of the Liberals is hard to do, but what I have observed time and again is that the Liberal politics of the Liberal Party of the 2020s is all performative politics. It just wants it to seem that it is doing something. If there is a problem, it has a solution: another organization, photo op or ribbon cutting, and the problem is solved. That is its problem.

Mr. Speaker, it is interesting that every time the member for Winnipeg North stands up, he is accusing us of filibustering. This is an important topic. It is very important for Canadians, certainly in my home province of British Columbia, where housing affordability really is a crisis for young people. These are important issues. We need to be debating them in the House of Commons, and that is exactly what we are doing.

Mr. Speaker, under the Liberal government, the Canadian dream of home ownership is rapidly fading for young people. CMHC reports that housing construction is actually going to be down over the next three years by up to 18% compared to last year. Why do the Liberals not just adopt the Conservative plan to eliminate GST on all new housing construction of up to $1.3 million and help restore the dream of home ownership for young Canadians?

Mr. Speaker, that answer is completely unacceptable. The Canadian Home Builders' Association says that, five years ago, new housing starts in the ownership market stood at 69%, the rest being in the rental market. Last year, that number dropped down to 49%. Despite all the nice talk, clearly the Liberal plans are not helpful for prospective new buyers. Again, why do they not just adopt our plans and help restore the dream of home ownership once again for Canadians?