44th Parl. 1st Sess.
October 21, 2022 10:00AM
- Oct/21/22 11:00:42 a.m.
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Madam Speaker, as we are coming to the end of Small Business Week, let me take members on a very quick tour of the incredible small businesses in my community of Ottawa Centre.
There is Devinder Chaudhary, owner of the Aiana Restaurant Collective in downtown Ottawa, who is changing the restaurant industry by paying his staff a living wage. Then there is Paula Naponse of Beandigen Cafe in Lansdowne Park, who is reinventing the coffee house model with an indigenous spin. I can also mention Justyna Borowska of Wedel Touch of Europe in Westboro, who is bringing authentic European cuisine to Ottawa. There are so many more examples of small businesses like these in my community of Ottawa Centre.
I am proud to see new spaces emerging across my community to support small, local entrepreneurs from equity-deserving communities. Over the past year, we have seen the Black entrepreneurship knowledge hub at Carleton University's school of business and the ADAAWE indigenous business hub to support young indigenous entrepreneurs.
I congratulate them all.
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- Oct/21/22 11:01:58 a.m.
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Madam Speaker, today I want to welcome and give congratulations to one of my constituents, Theresa Bailey, and her co-author, Terry Marcotte of Ottawa, for their recent publication of Hockey Moms: The Heart of the Game.
This book is a collection of insightful stories from the perspective of Canadian hockey moms and celebrates the foundational strength that these women provide to families and hockey programs across Canada. This book is shifting the narrative of hockey in Canada to the potential ahead that results from diversity, inclusion and the common thread we as hockey moms and all Canadians value and share: the love of our children and the love of the game.
I trust the House will join me in congratulating Theresa and Terry for this monumental milestone. Having grown up in Madoc, I know Theresa has made Hastings—Lennox and Addington very proud.
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- Oct/21/22 11:37:36 a.m.
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Mr. Speaker, the truckers' occupation of Ottawa dragged on because the federal government blocked any possibility of intervention for three weeks.
We know that when the City of Ottawa asked for reinforcements of 1,800 police officers, the federal government did not grant the request. However, we also learned from the commission that the mayor of Ottawa, Jim Watson, repeatedly asked the federal government to appoint a mediator. This request was also refused. For three weeks, there was no police reinforcement, no mediation, no progress.
Why did the federal government block any possibility of intervention for three weeks, while residents were being held hostage?
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- Oct/21/22 11:38:55 a.m.
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Madam Speaker, that is not true. Crisis management is about hours, maybe days. Not three weeks.
After three weeks of inaction, it was not the emergency measures that brought an end to the siege of Ottawa. It was the police. It was the 1,800 or 1,900 additional police officers that the City of Ottawa had been calling for all along.
The moment the city got those reinforcements, an operation was launched, and less than 48 hours later, the streets of Ottawa were empty. It was the police who ended the siege of Ottawa.
Why did the federal government sit on its hands for three weeks, doing nothing to mobilize and coordinate police officers?
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- Oct/21/22 11:39:33 a.m.
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Madam Speaker, I can tell members from first-hand experience, as the local member of Parliament for the area, that the occupation and downtown Ottawa were extremely distressing for the residents who live in the downtown core, and for many businesses. The federal government worked extremely closely with the municipal government and its provincial counterparts to make sure all the resources that were needed were provided, so we could end the occupation as quickly as possible.
We all wish that the occupation had not lasted for three weeks, and that is why we had to invoke the Emergencies Act, to put an end to the occupation and to make sure our borders were not blockaded.
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- Oct/21/22 11:38:15 a.m.
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Madam Speaker, I can tell members that the federal government was engaged in ensuring that we ended the illegal occupation of Ottawa and the illegal closure of our borders as well. We worked very closely with local police authorities that were responsible for providing policing here, in the case of Ottawa for instance, by providing resources as they were needed. At the end of the day, we needed to invoke the Emergencies Act because things were not getting done, and the result is that the occupation came to an end.
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Madam Speaker, the Fédération professionnelle des journalistes du Québec spoke out against the government's source hunting. It fears that Ottawa is discouraging whistle-blowers when it should in fact be protecting them. It is concerned, and rightly so, because Canada has the weakest whistle-blower legislation in the world. According to the International Bar Association, Canada ranks 50th out of 50.
That is why the Bloc Québécois has introduced Bill C‑290 to better protect public servants who blow the whistle.
Will the government support our bill instead of basically going on a witch hunt trying to track down sources within its own ranks?
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