hazylavender/hi huggingface dataset:
The Budget
Date: 2023_04_18
Chamber: HOUSE OF COMMONS
Ms. Rachel Bendayan: my colleague talked about a lot of things, including the importance of addressing the violence playing out on our streets, and yet the Conservatives continue to oppose all the gun control measures we are proposing. However, let us talk about our budget. My colleague spent a lot of time talking down the Canadian economy, when we know that it is much more resilient than that of our peers. We brought Rio Tinto to Sorel and Moderna to Laval. We also brought 5,000 new jobs to Becancourt, and this is just in Quebec. When my colleague talks about the importance of reducing government spending, is he talking about the $2 billion that is being invested in health care for Canadians? Since the Conservative leader has confirmed--
The Budget
Date: 2023_04_18
Chamber: HOUSE OF COMMONS
Mr. Luc Desilets: we know the Conservatives' position in terms of the budget, the cuts they would make if they were in power, major budgetary restrictions and balancing the budget. This evening, 150,000 federal public servants will quite likely go on strike. I would like to ask my colleague from Charlesbourg--Haute-Saint-Charles the following. If he were the minister in such a situation, would he accept the federal public servants' salary conditions to avoid a strike?
The Budget
Date: 2023_04_18
Chamber: HOUSE OF COMMONS
Mr. Pierre Paul-Hus: it is the government's responsibility to manage its public service properly. There is a strike mandate right now because this government did not do its job of managing the public service properly. It hired 30% more public servants, it awards external contracts, and in the meantime, working conditions are being mismanaged. I cannot necessarily respond directly to my colleague's question because I do not have all the information on the demands. The fact remains that good public management means knowing how to work with the resources on hand, hiring the necessary number of people to complete tasks on budget, and ensuring that employees are paid properly. However, if the government hires people, spends money elsewhere and cannot afford to pay them more, then there is a problem.
The Budget
Date: 2023_04_18
Chamber: HOUSE OF COMMONS
Mr. Arnold Viersen: I just want to ask my hon. colleague what his thoughts are on the fact that the Liberal government is continuing to deficit-spend, even though it promised, way back in 2015, that it would run only four modest deficits of $10 billion, which it has never even come close to. Budget 2023 is $43 billion. I am wondering what my colleague has to say about that.
The Budget
Date: 2023_04_18
Chamber: HOUSE OF COMMONS
Mr. Pierre Paul-Hus: that is an excellent question. We remember very clearly that the Prime Minister did some marketing during the 2015 election campaign. He said that the Liberals would generate small $10-billion deficits in order to heavily invest in Canadian infrastructure. However, during that government's first four years, it ran $100 billion in additional deficits. A few billion dollars were invested in infrastructure, because nothing was forthcoming. It was all smoke and mirrors. They said there would be small deficits to allow investments in infrastructure. No one can object to that. However, ultimately, $100 billion went up in smoke. That was the result after the first four years. Now, we are way past that point.
The Budget
Date: 2023_04_18
Chamber: HOUSE OF COMMONS
Ms. Rachel Bendayan: I will try for the fourth time to get an answer to my question. We see the Conservatives pivoting. All the Conservatives agree not to touch the $2 billion we will invest in health care. We also put very clear and specific measures in the budget to cut government spending by $15 billion. This includes vendor contracts. It includes cuts to the public service. Since those are the facts, here is my question for my colleague. What would the Conservatives cut? What cuts would they make to achieve their austerity goals?
The Budget
Date: 2023_04_18
Chamber: HOUSE OF COMMONS
Mr. Luc Berthold: it is rather ironic to hear such a question. The member just told us that the budget contains $15 billion in cuts. However, there is no indication anywhere of where these $15 billion in cuts will be made. At this time, the Minister of Finance is leading the country. Now I am being asked to do her job. I would be only too happy to do her job. Our Conservative team will be only too happy to do a good job by managing this country's finances in a fiscally responsible manner when we are elected and have the opportunity to be on that side of the House.
The Budget
Date: 2023_04_18
Chamber: HOUSE OF COMMONS
Mr. Alexis Brunelle-Duceppe: I really enjoyed my hon. colleague's speech. What is interesting is that the Conservatives are saying that they will be a responsible government and that they will form the next government. Now, my colleague did not specify exactly what the Conservatives would do to balance the budget. I heard one proposal from the Conservative leader. Earlier, my colleague quoted the Deputy Prime Minister , the Minister of Finance, but I am going to quote his leader. During the Conservative Party leadership campaign, he said that he would cut $1 billion from CBC/Radio-Canada's budget, which is currently $1.2 billion. Not one Conservative member from Quebec has wanted to answer the question we have been asking for two days now. I would really like someone to answer me. Does my hon. colleague agree with his leader's proposal? If the Conservative Party takes office here in Ottawa, will the member support his leader's proposal to cut CBC/Radio-Canada's $1.2-billion budget by $1 billion?
The Budget
Date: 2023_04_18
Chamber: HOUSE OF COMMONS
Mr. Luc Berthold: that is a very good question. I think that if I were a Liberal right now, I would be asking myself some serious questions about who is really leading the Minister of Finance when the time comes to write a budget. What we see in the budget is $67 billion in new spending on new programs. I am not the only one saying this. People have seen the budget and read it. The Parliamentary Budget Officer said it. It contains $67 billion in spending. That means even more borrowing, even more problems, even more inflationary spending that will ultimately increase costs for all Canadians, workers, mothers, everyone. That is the current reality. That is what happens when a Liberal government forms a coalition with the NDP. In the end, everyone pays the price. Unfortunately, we do not trust anyone to deliver these programs, because we know that when it comes to program delivery, the current government's performance over the past few years has been feeble. Take passports, for example, or employment insurance. I could keep listing examples until I sit down.
The Budget
Date: 2023_04_18
Chamber: HOUSE OF COMMONS
Mr. Kevin Lamoureux: what I will try to do in a very short period of time is amplify the contrast between the Conservative opposition and what we have been doing here in government. When we think of the budget, we need to recognize that the budget in its entirety is a reflection, based on what I mentioned the other day, of a great deal of consultation and a great deal of effort that has been put together in order to ensure that this is a budget that serves every Canadian from coast to coast to coast. It is very clear in terms of the manner in which it does that. No matter how many times the Conservatives will say that there is no plan, there is a detailed plan. It is there in front of all of us. All one has to do is be prepared to do a bit of reading. There are many aspects of this budget that will continue to support Canadians, build our economy and build our society in a direction that I believe a vast majority of Canadians would approve of. The Conservatives seem to be of the opinion that when the government spends money, it is not a good idea. I wanted to amplify the issue of child care. People will recall in the last election the Conservative Party said it did not support the national child care program the Liberals were talking about. We now have all provinces and territories onside. We are investing in child care and the Conservatives opposed that. When we think of child care, it does mean that the government is spending money. A February report that came out said the participation rate for women between 25 and 54 is at an all-time high of 85.7%. I suggest that is the highest in North America. At the end of the day, a child care program that provides $10-a-day child care, what the Conservative Party opposes, will ultimately provide more opportunities and enhance the lifestyles of all Canadians as a direct result. That is investing in Canadians. We can talk about the $198 billion over the next 10 years, which is a genuine commitment to financing our health care system, not only for today, but for future generations. It shows the federal government does have a role to play in long-term care, mental health and other issues that Canadians are concerned about. They are reflected in this budget. People understand and appreciate that health care is at the core of what our Canadian identity is all about. The budget reflects that desire. We can talk about the inflation rate. The Conservative Party always seems to want to forget that this is a worldwide inflation situation. In Canada, we are doing so much better than virtually all of our peer countries, including the United States. We know we can do more. That is why we have the grocery rebate. It is a one-time grocery rebate because we understand the difficulty that Canadians are going through. I see my time has already expired. I would suggest to members opposite that all they need to do is understand the budget, and then I am sure they will rethink their position and vote in favour of it.
Date: 2023_04_18
Chamber: HOUSE OF COMMONS
Mr. Kevin Lamoureux: it is interesting listening to my friend across the way. Whenever he has the opportunity to amp up the whole concept of something wrong, or corruption or whatever it might be, he never passes on that opportunity. Today is a good example if we take a look at question period. Here we are in the debates of the budget and the Conservatives are looking at ways in which they can turn it into personal attacks. Why is that relevant? The member himself makes reference to Dominic Barton and tries to give the impression the Prime Minister is buddy-buddy with Dominic. We have heard that consistently. Members opposite would say that even in the heat of the debate. They try to play up the fact there is this huge friendship between the Prime Minister and Dominic, and it is not true. When Dominic went to the standing committee to address a number of different issues, he made it very clear they were not friends, from what I understand. At the end of the day, there is a process. At times, there is a need for government to look at contracting out. Putting things in proper perspective can be a very significant challenge for the Conservative Party because it goes against what its members want to focus on. If there were some deviations from the actual policy or protocols put into place, the member has standing committees in which he can raise the issue in expectation of getting some sort of response. What I am expecting to hear when the members stand up is an exaggeration from a bias that always brings it back to looking for some form of scandal, even if there is no scandal to be found. That is 99.9% of the time. I do not want to discourage the member, but I suspect if one takes a look at the history of McKinsey one will likely find there are Conservative administrations that also used that particular firm. Whether it is at the federal or provincial level, I would like to think the member would acknowledge there are times in which governments at different levels and in different regions of the world turn to professionals to look at how they might be able to facilitate the government in doing something it is hoping to accomplish, and that is done through a tendering process. Canada is looked upon around the world as a nation that has a very good process. It does not mean we cannot improve upon it. We are constantly looking at ways in which we can improve procurement processes, because we understand and appreciate the importance of the integrity of the system. That is something I will always be advocating for.
Date: 2023_04_18
Chamber: HOUSE OF COMMONS
Mr. Kevin Lamoureux: the member started off his four-minute question by talking about how the government was trying to hide things and was being secretive. A press release went out. When the government issues a press release, it is far from being secretive. I asked the member a question in a heckle. I know we are not supposed to heckle, but I posed a question across the way. I asked him to tell me what rule was broken and the member had no idea. I do not think he has any idea whatsoever what rule was actually broken. If I am wrong, he can please stand up and let me know I am wrong, but I suspect I am not wrong. He does not know what rule was broken, but it is good for amping this up and trying to make it look as if it is something that it likely is not. That is something the member across the way is fairly good at.
Date: 2023_04_18
Chamber: HOUSE OF COMMONS
Mr. Michael Barrett: it is a pleasure to rise today to talk about the issues affecting Canadians. I have heard regularly from folks in my community and from folks right across Canada about the struggles they are having with the made-in-Canada cost of living crisis. On April 1, the government made a choice to make things harder for people who are struggling to put food on the table for their families. It made a choice to make it harder for people who are putting gas in the tanks of their cars so they can get to work, get to extracurricular activities for their children like hockey, dance and soccer, and just get around. In communities like mine, folks do not have the option to change or modify their behaviour in the way that the government is looking for them to do. There is no subway, SkyTrain or rapid transit system to get people across rural southern Ontario or eastern Ontario, which is also true in many parts of this country. The reality of rising fuel prices at the pumps, the reality of rising prices at the grocery store and the reality of folks facing soaring costs to heat their homes is that people are making really tough choices. It is not like the tough choice the Deputy Prime Minister talked about to scale back on Disney+. People are skipping meals, working Canadians. Here is the best example I can give. The food bank in Brockville had to change its hours and modify its service delivery so it could accommodate folks who needed to get to the food bank after they finished work. People are working their jobs, taking home a paycheque and still do not have enough money to afford food at the grocery store or enough food to sustain their families, so they are going to the food bank. This is a devastating situation, and as we saw from the Parliamentary Budget Officer, the average Canadian household is going to pay $710 more this year than they would have if there were no carbon tax in place. Therefore, after people get that rebate, they are still left over $700 more in the hole than they would be if they were not paying for this carbon tax. The carbon is not going to change the weather. The carbon tax is not going to change the changing climate. If the government was serious about climate policy, it would have a climate plan, not a tax plan that hurts Canadians and disproportionately hurts Canadians living in rural and remote communities. When is the government going to axe its carbon tax and put in place a plan that exports clean Canadian energy, displaces the high-carbon economies around the world that burn resources that are less clean than clean Canadian natural gas, displaces high emitters in favour of good, clean Canadian jobs and helps Canadians afford to put food on the table and heat their homes?
Date: 2023_04_18
Chamber: HOUSE OF COMMONS
Mr. Kevin Lamoureux: I am sure the member's memory is at least as good as mine, and we were in a federal election not that long ago. He will recall that there were 338 Conservative candidates all over Canada saying to Canadians that they supported a price on pollution. That is the carbon tax. That is what the member was just talking about. Therefore, in the last federal election, 338 members of the Conservative Party of Canada went all over the country saying they supported a carbon tax. Then they got a nice, shiny, brand new leader, and now they say they want to be able to oppose the carbon tax, the price on pollution. That was the most recent flip. They have been all over the place. They are like fish out of water. Has anyone seen a fish flip and flop all over a deck? That is kind of like how the Conservative Party has been on this issue. To top it off, its most recent position is to get rid of the price on pollution, or the "carbon tax", as the Conservatives like to call it. They say it is such a burden. Do members know that 80%-plus of the constituents I represent will actually get more money than they are paying into it? A vast majority of my constituents are going to realize a larger net gain because of the price on pollution. That comes out of the office of the independent budget officer, when we look dollar for dollar. As such, when the Conservatives say they are going to get rid of the carbon tax, they would be taking money out of the pockets of almost 80% of Canadians. That is what they would be doing, but they do not talk about that. When they talk about how we are going to increase the price on pollution, or the "carbon tax", as they like to refer to it, they do not talk about the increase for the environmental tax rebate that is going to Canadians. These are the types of questionable comments we get from the Conservative Party of Canada. They are flip-flopping on all sorts of different issues, including the price on pollution, or the carbon tax. They are then trying to mislead Canadians by giving people in Winnipeg North the impression that, if the Conservative Party killed the price on pollution, they would benefit. In fact, it is the absolute opposite. A vast majority of my constituents would lose on the Conservative promise to get rid of the carbon tax. That is the reality. When a Conservative member stands up and says it is about the cost of living, we should deal with the cost of living. What is the Conservative Party doing? There is the dental plan expansion. Members can imagine the tens of thousands of seniors whom the dental plan would benefit, helping them with the cost of living. The Conservatives have voted against that. They are going to be voting against the budget; they told us that. That is where we would be getting the grocery rebate. Members can imagine the 11 million Canadians who would be getting a rebate for groceries, under this budget, to deal with the cost of living crisis. That very member has constituents who would benefit from it, yet the Conservatives ignore it and vote against the things that are going to benefit Canadians.
Date: 2023_04_18
Chamber: HOUSE OF COMMONS
Mr. Michael Barrett: if the government were serious about addressing greenhouse gas emissions, it would build pipelines, export LNG and displace the emissions created by countries that are burning coal. However, it is not going to. That would have a substantive impact on global greenhouse gas emissions. Instead, however, the Liberals punish Canadians for living their lives. It costs them more. It costs the average Canadian household more than $700 more than it is going to get back after the rebate in the carbon tax pyramid scheme the government has cooked up. Canadians see it for what it is. It is not a climate plan; it is a tax plan. Canadians deserve better. When are the Liberals going to get out of the way so we can give it to them?
Date: 2023_04_18
Chamber: HOUSE OF COMMONS
Mr. Kevin Lamoureux: the member said that we are not exporting natural gas, but what is LNG? The federal government worked with the NDP provincial government in B.C. on the biggest-ever government and private investment in the exportation of natural gas. That is one hit against what the member just finished saying. Then the member said that we do not build pipelines. What does he call Trans Mountain? Stephen Harper, in 10 years, could not build an inch of pipeline to coastal waters, yet we have Trans Mountain. However, we still understand and appreciate the important issues of indigenous consultation and the environment. That is why we passed legislation for net zero by 2050. We have set targets and brought in government tax benefits and programs of all sorts to ensure that we get to that net zero.
Date: 2023_04_18
Chamber: HOUSE OF COMMONS
Mr. Scott Reid: I take it this evening my question will be addressed by the parliamentary secretary for all departments. On the final sitting day prior to the Easter break, I rose in this place to ask the immigration minister the following question: ...the immigration minister's program to admit the families of language and cultural advisers who assisted our troops in Afghanistan has such rigid criteria that it will freeze out almost everybody it should be helping. For example, only those who were still in Afghanistan after July 22, 2021 are eligible, so this rules out the Afghans who were in the most dangerous parts of the country and who therefore had to flee...before the Taliban overran their regions. These family members are now trapped in third countries and are in danger of being transported back to Afghanistan, where they will be killed. Will the minister change these restrictive criteria to fix the mess he has created? The response I received from the government benches left me puzzled. The hon. member for Orleans , who responded on behalf of the government, said the following: If it were a matter of will, there would be 40,000 Afghan refugees here already, but we know that in reality, with everything that has been happening, there have been challenges and obstacles. We are working very hard in addressing those, for instance through Bill C-41. There are a number of factors that we do not fully control, including safe passage. Now, the most obvious problem with this answer is that the particular impediment which I was addressing, the government's choice to refuse to admit any person who left Afghanistan prior to July 22, 2021, is absolutely a factor that the government does control. They could change that date. Therefore, I will just repeat my question in slightly different words. Will the government change this particular criteria and extend Canada's protection to Afghans who meet all of the eligibility criteria but who left the country prior to July 22, 2021?