44th Parl. 1st Sess.
May 19, 2022 10:00AM
- May/19/22 1:08:42 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, I think the frustration that stems from most reasonable people in this chamber is about the fact that when a question is asked, what experts are you relying upon? What is the advice that has been given? Share that advice with Canadians. If you have reports or expert advice saying we cannot open this airport or we cannot remove restrictions and here is why, why not share it?
The fact of the matter is that they do not have it, and that is why they will not table it. If you had it, you would table it. Any reasonable person would, but we are not dealing with reasonable people or rationality. Why will they not table this advice now?
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- May/19/22 1:29:38 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, I will be sharing my time with the member for Calgary Forest Lawn.
I have had the misfortune of listening to this debate for the past hour and a bit. When I use the term “misfortune”, it is because of the absolute opacity of the government. It refuses to answer even the simplest of questions during debate. Liberal members give speeches where they are obsessed with the member for Carleton, when we are supposed to be discussing the very serious issue of chaos at airports and the restrictions that are in place.
Rather than talk about that, the Liberals are going on long diatribes about independence, other members and leadership matters. I think we have to ask ourselves why. If they cannot talk about the subject matter before us, it is probably because they have almost nothing to say. That is the absolute problem with the government and these members participating in the debate.
Why are we here? Day after day, questions are asked about when the mandates will end, and what circumstances are needed in order to do that. These are not ridiculous partisan attacks, as the members across seem to suggest. I did not know they were so fragile that a direct question would be seen as a terrible partisan attack.
We keep coming back and asking reasonable questions. We brought forward a motion ages ago, just asking what conditions, metrics or benchmarks the country had to hit so restrictions could be removed. This is not asking for them to be removed. It is asking what the benchmarks are and what Canadians could look to. The Liberals would not even vote for that. The government cannot do anything reasonable with respect to things like this.
When we ask questions, we get answers like the one from the Minister of Transport, who said that travellers are out of practice and that is why the airports are backed up. Actually, that is, unfortunately, probably the best answer we have had from a minister or a member of the government with respect to what is going on, because at least it was an answer.
We have questions, real questions, the questions Canadians are asking. I know these members get the same emails from Canadians. They cannot live in some strange Liberal bubble where everyone thinks things are perfect. They must get questions about what is happening at the airports and what are they going to do to fix it. I know I get them. I bet the Speaker is getting them as well.
We put forward a motion like this to say that Canadians have had enough, that they want to see some action. They want something done. We would expect a reasonably serious response. However, for some reason, Canadians are not entitled to that. When we are here, we are the voice of not only our constituents, but also of other Canadians as well. These are the serious questions that are being asked. It is so insulting to them. I do not care about the insults that government members throw at us. We can take it. Over here, we are not so fragile. We can take the insults, but Canadians deserve those answers.
We heard the member for Winnipeg North giving his speech. I had the opportunity to ask him what the advice was, whose advice it was, what was the actual advice is, and if he could table the advice. They were insane, ridiculous questions. How dare I ask the Liberals to share the advice they had with Canadians to show why they would not remove any of the restrictions.
We have heard the terrible stories, which is why we are asking the questions. We heard the member for Prince Albert talk about a terrible experience he witnessed at the airport. I have seen that as well. People who are desperate and missing their flights. People who are having all kinds of trouble. There is not even a semblance of regret from the government about that.
That is fine. If the Liberals do not want to say to Canadians that they are sorry they are going through this, then that is on them. However, Canadians deserve an explanation.
The Liberals must have meetings. They must be talking to experts, because they say, “We follow the experts' advice.” How hard is it? Throw Canadians a bone. They could give us a scrap of information, or maybe put a tenth of the report on the table so that we can see that there actually is a report, but they will not. If they will not do it, we have to ask ourselves why, right?
When a child goes to school and says, “The dog ate my homework”, the teacher asks, “Show me the shredded pieces and then I will believe you.” That is what these guys are doing all the time. They are saying, “The dog ate my homework.” Well, they should show us the scraps, but we cannot even see that. They are not going to give us even that little tidbit.
Canadians are frustrated. There are a lot of Canadians who cannot travel. I do not know if members have heard the stories, but I certainly have in my riding about people who cannot travel and miss all kinds of things. The Liberals might say, “Well, get in a car.” However, an 80-year-old unvaccinated woman from my riding cannot drive 1,800 to 3,000 kilometres to B.C. The Liberals' answer is: “We do not care. We refuse to give any information on when that person is going to be able to travel. We refuse to give any information as to why we are saying that person will not be able to travel. We refuse to give any information as to when that person can travel.”
It is as though we are asking for the most unreasonable, unrealistic things. That is how the Liberals paint the debate. They cannot answer the debate directly. They cannot answer the debate forthrightly. If they really wanted to debate this issue, they would put their advice on the table so that we could all see it and debate it like adults, but they do not want to. They would rather give speeches talking about the former shadow minister for finance. They want to talk about the member for Carleton, because that is so pertinent to the debate. It is so childish and insulting to Canadians who are asking the very serious questions that we are raising in this motion to have members over there treat them with so much disdain and disrespect.
I cannot believe it. Canadians who are unable to travel, unable to visit family and relatives, are watching this debate and listening to the kinds of speeches that these people are putting out, joking and laughing about the member for Carleton. It is beyond shameful. It is embarrassing, and they should be embarrassed for participating that way.
We want things to move forward for Canadians. We want answers. We tried for a motion to ask the Liberals to put the benchmarks out for everyone to see: When we get to this, we will do this, and when we get to that, we will do that. The Liberals voted down the motion, unfortunately, with help from the NDP. We had a wonderful NDP member asking some great questions, but they voted down that motion as well, and I am disappointed about that.
We have to ask ourselves: Why will the Liberals not do any of these things? It is probably because they have not set that plan out, because this is a government that cannot do more than one thing, as we have learned. They sort of stumble from one crisis to another. We choose to joke and say: “You cannot walk and chew gum at the same time.” That is kind of what we have happening here.
Now, we are back to another motion saying, “You would not give us the benchmarks, all the rest of the world has moved forward, they are lifting all these things, so let us get on with it.” Let us get on with it. Let us actually say that this is what we are going to do.
I, of course, will be voting in favour of this motion. I know that the Liberals will not be, but I am hoping other parties will. I am hoping that other members listening today will decide not to talk about the member for Carleton and will actually stand here and debate this issue, because if they do not, it tells us exactly what we need to know about them, which is that they have nothing to offer on this subject.
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- May/19/22 1:40:16 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, again we see an example of what we get with this member in particular and the current government. They do not want to have an honest debate about subjects. When I say give the information, it is because just about every time they get up to speak they talk about how they are following the science, which is why they are going to vote against this motion. It is the crux of their argument as to why they will not support the motion. They say, “We are going to follow the science, so we are not going to remove any restrictions.” However, when we ask them for that science, there is none. It is a shock. They have nothing to actually add to the debate.
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- May/19/22 1:42:13 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, I cannot go over what we have done differently for the past two and a half years because I have only a few moments, but what I will say we would do differently right now is this. We would have released what the benchmarks are to get back to normal, because Canadians want to get back to normal. We all want to. I would release the science we are relying on to say we cannot open up now. We would say where we are, where we need to be and at what points we would remove certain restrictions.
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- May/19/22 1:43:00 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, the member keeps heckling and asking where my science is. We are not the government. We do not have access to the science it has at the Ministry of Health. Why will it not produce it? It probably has not done it, because it really cannot do much.
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- May/19/22 1:43:38 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, I struggle to understand what those would be. I think many of them served a purpose and we all acknowledge that, but I do not know what we want to keep in place forever because of the chaos it is causing right now at airports. If we keep these measures in place forever, how are we ever going to get back to normal? That is the issue. Canadians want to get back to normal. They want a plan to get back to normal. If the government is not going to give us a plan, we are going to put forward a motion to get us back to normal.
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- May/19/22 1:44:25 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, this is exactly it. We can go to a stadium and watch a hockey or basketball game without a mask. These members go to receptions every night in crowded rooms without wearing masks, but they wear their masks in the chamber. Yes, things have moved on. It is time for us to move on with these restrictions, as well.
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