44th Parl. 1st Sess.
February 15, 2022 10:00AM
Madam Speaker, the sense of urgency is so real. These are the lowest-income seniors in our country who have had clawbacks because of the failure of the Liberal government.
As the New Democrats, we are here to get help for seniors now. I want to give a shout-out to my colleague, the MP for North Island—Powell River, for being vigilant and pressing the government to fix this problem. We are here to help Canadians and seniors right now. We have been fighting this fight since the get-go. We want some certainty from the government and the minister that they are going to roll out immediate supports for those who need help now, in March, which is just weeks away, so that in April, all of the clawbacks will be repaid to the seniors who are struggling right now.
Will the minister listen to the New Democrats, who are calling for a guaranteed livable basic income, brought forward by my colleague from Winnipeg Centre, so that no seniors are living in poverty? I hope the minister will really listen to the New Democrats' proposal to do that because we should all agree in the House that no senior and no person living with a disability should be living below the poverty line. They need a guaranteed livable annual income.
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Madam Speaker, I first want to thank my colleague whom I have a great respect for. However, my concern is the lack of urgency from the Conservative bench. These are the lowest-income seniors in our country who have had their GIS clawed back. They cannot afford their rent, food or medicine. Some of them are cutting their pills in half. That is unacceptable. Today, we are talking about an urgent situation so that those people who have been cut off get help now.
Does my colleague support our call for a guaranteed livable income so that no seniors in this country are living in poverty and have to go through a situation like this ever again?
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Madam Speaker, I want to go back to my colleague for the question about a guaranteed annual livable income. He did not answer it. We know that seniors are living in poverty, and I want to know if the Conservatives support ensuring that no seniors are living below the poverty line. A guaranteed livable income would ensure that will not happen. We are all disappointed about the Liberals dropping the ball on this clawback and why we are having this debate today, but I want to hear about long-term solutions and I want to hear if my colleague supports them.
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Mr. Speaker, my colleague talked passionately about the need to support seniors. Clearly this is an urgent situation. These are the most vulnerable seniors in our country that the government has gone after with clawbacks. I really want to thank the member for North Island—Powell River for the important work she did on pressuring the government to respond to this situation.
Does my colleague agree that the government is paying for the pandemic off the backs of poor Canadians by going after seniors in this circumstance? Does she agree that instead it should be going after the billionaires and the big corporations that have profited from the pandemic?
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Mr. Speaker, first, the member for Elgin—Middlesex—London talked about her parents watching, and she must be very proud. They have a wonderful daughter, and I always appreciate her interventions.
However, I have an issue the member's party when it comes to seniors. Conservative members voted against really important NDP proposals, such as pharmacare to help seniors make sure they get access to medicine, dental care for those who cannot afford it and a guaranteed annual livable income so that no senior is living in poverty. They even voted against taxing CEOs and closing tax loopholes or tax havens for the super-wealthy, measures that would pay for those programs.
Eleanor Joy, from Parksville, is telling me that the clawback has made it impossible for her to be able to buy food plus pay for medicine plus pay her rent. I ask the member if she would agree that the government should be paying for the pandemic recovery off the backs of billionaires and not off the poorest of Canadians, especially our seniors.
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- Feb/15/22 2:14:15 p.m.
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Mr. Speaker, the Nuu-chah-nulth people lost a hero last fall. Willard Gallic Sr. was a respected elder of the Tseshaht First Nation. He passed at the age of 81, following a life of joy and accomplishment.
He dedicated his life to standing up for Nuu-chah-nulth rights, treaty negotiations and language and culture. He worked on the docks and was an active member of Local 503 of the International Longshoremen's Union, becoming the first indigenous person to be elected as president of their local and eventually international vice-president.
I met Willard when he invited me to a reclaiming lost souls for residential school survivors ceremony in 2019. On that day, he told us the residential school was put on Tseshaht land without the permission of his people, but he called for a new beginning. “We want to set souls free. We want to send them home,” he said. The Indian agent had come for six-year-old Willard in 1946, but his dad stood firm and Willard was not taken. “ 'You are not taking him',” Willard said as he told the story of his dad confronting the agent, “and my mom backed him up.” It was an act of courage that shaped the life of qiiqiiqiy'a, a hero to his people. May he rest in peace.
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