44th Parl. 1st Sess.
December 13, 2022 10:00AM
Madam Speaker, I want to start by expressing my sincere condolences to the family, friends and colleagues of Jim Carr. He was a devoted parliamentarian who worked tirelessly for his community. He will be missed forever.
I am pleased to join the debate on Bill C-291, an act to amend the Criminal Code and to make consequential amendments to other acts, regarding child sexual abuse and exploitation material, introduced by the member for North Okanagan—Shuswap on June 17.
At the outset, I would like to acknowledge and thank my colleague for introducing this bill, which has a very important objective, to ensure that the terminology used to refer to child pornography means that this harmful material is actually abuse of children.
The Government of Canada is committed to preventing and protecting children from sexual abuse and exploitation of any kind, including in Canada and abroad.
Canada works closely with international partners to combat online child sexual exploitation—
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The time provided for the consideration of Private Members' Business has now expired, and the order is dropped to the bottom of the order of precedence on the Order Paper.
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- Dec/13/22 6:33:34 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, on Tuesday last week, the Auditor General released an absolutely damning report on the government's COVID-19 programs. This is report 10 from the Auditor General. This report chronicled mismanagement, waste and a lack of focus leading to tens of billions of dollars in government waste.
Let us be very clear: We are not talking about the policy of the COVID support programs. This was a policy that, in principle, all parties supported and it is not the Auditor General's mandate to critique the government's policy, but rather to analyze the effectiveness of implementation. That is whether the actions of government lined up with the stated policy goals.
The Auditor General pointed out that the government made a policy decision not to have an effective pre-disbursement review. It basically relied on an attestation model, an honour system, where people would say they met the criteria and they would get the benefits. Many Canadians were honest and accurate in how they filled those out.
Generally, we say there should be some kind of verification mechanism, either before or afterward. The government said that it needed to get these dollars out the door quickly in terms of these benefits, so it did not do the advance verification, but it said it would do verification after the fact. It would follow up and see if the money went to the right people, and if it did not go to the right people, it would follow up in the appropriate fashion.
The government is now saying it is not going to do those after-the-fact reviews and verifications in every case. For much of the money that the government spent in various COVID-19 support programs, there was no checking before the money went out and no checking after the money was received. This means people could simply attest that they were eligible for benefits. They got cheques as a result and there was no verification.
The Auditor General was able, based on data the government already had available, to assess what indicators there were of whether people who did not meet the requirements of various programs ended up getting money anyway. Here is what she found.
Incredibly, she found that $4.6 billion went to ineligible recipients. That means people who were not eligible for these programs still got money to the tune of $4.6 billion.
Another $27.4 billion went to individuals who, on the face of it, did not meet the program criteria where the Auditor General conservatively says further investigation is required. There were cases, for instance, where individuals did not meet the income requirements, yet still received CERB.
The total of certainly ineligible or almost certainly ineligible, based on the Auditor General's analysis of data in the government's own possession, came to $32 billion. Some $32 billion of COVID-19 benefits went out to individuals who were not eligible for those benefits.
Again, we are not talking about whether offering this support was a good idea. We are talking about whether the government should be held accountable for over $30 billion going to those who did not meet the stated criteria for those programs.
The Auditor General is recommending in this report that the government follow up, get to the bottom of this and track down that money. The government does not agree, does not support it and will not implement this recommendation of the Auditor General. It says, on the final page of the report, that it will not follow up with every one of these cases, as the Auditor General recommends.
The response of the Minister of National Revenue when this issue was raised in the House was to impugn the Auditor General's independence. The Minister of National Revenue got up in this House and said that the Auditor General made the decisions and the recommendations because of pressure from the opposition, which is a totally outrageous attack on a strong, independent public servant by the government simply to cover up its own incompetence.
The government wasted $30 billion. It should be held accountable for that waste and it should not be attacking the Auditor General.
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- Dec/13/22 6:37:40 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, that was an interesting speech, as always, from our colleague.
I would remiss if I did not begin tonight by speaking about the late Jim Carr, a colleague to all of us and a friend to many. He was someone who served with distinction provincially and federally, among so many other different pursuits, and who had a very impressive life. He was a mentor to many MPs who began with him in 2015, and words of advice given by him over the years will not be forgotten, certainly not by myself, not by anyone.
I listened with interest to the hon. member, and we thank the Auditor General for her report, which was tabled last week. The government affirms her independence and integrity, which is true of the minister and true of myself. As I said, this is a very important office, and we affirm all of those important principles. In listening to my hon. colleague though, I wonder if he actually read the report or only those parts he could use to his political advantage.
First of all, the report makes clear that, without the emergency programs put in place, the poverty rate in Canada would have doubled. Particularly important was the CERB, but there was also the wage subsidy. It is also true that we would have seen th massive economic contraction that was impacting the country at the outset of the pandemic simply continue. In 2020, we saw GDP contract by 17%. Again, this is all in the report.
I am sure my friend has the report at hand, if he has not looked at it already, which I suspect he has not, but he can easily bring it up. The report makes clear that, by November 2021, the economy had come back to prepandemic levels. Again, that is because of the emergency programs that were put in place by the the government and supported by all parties in the House.
Interesting also is what was said by the Parliamentary Budget Officer, who recently made it clear that, were it not for the programs, the results for the country would have been “catastrophic”. We would have seen mass bankruptcies, and it would have resulted in significant human costs. Again, I leave that for the consideration of the hon. member.
Underpinning all of the emergency programs, of course, was the attestation-based approach put in place by the government to ensure that funds needed by Canadians, either individuals, families or businesses, were dispensed very quickly, and I am thinking of CERB, the wage subsidy and various other programs. The attestation-based approach made that very possible.
Verification is certainly the objective, but it comes after the fact, which is about the only part of the speech from my hon. colleague across the way that I agree with. Verification was not possible at the beginning. It had to come after the fact because of the unique circumstance, which was a crisis. A crisis necessitates specific approaches tailored to the moment. This is why the government took the approach that it did. The work is ongoing to verify whether or not individuals, businesses and others were actually in need of the various supports that were received.
Yes, there is respectful disagreement on the $27.4 billion between the CRA and the Auditor General, which is, again, a respectful disagreement over calculating the wage subsidy eligibility over GST revenue loss versus general revenue loss. That is a technical matter that will be sorted out.
Over 800,000 notices of redetermination have been given to individuals. Thousands more will be sent. The work of the CRA continues on these matters. It is very serious about ensuring fiscal responsibility and verification.
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- Dec/13/22 6:41:34 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, the member is trying to constantly shift this into a debate about whether or not the emergency benefits were a good policy. As he pointed out, all parties supported providing emergency supports during COVID. However, the question is not whether these emergency benefits were required and were valuable. The question is whether the government was right to pay tens of billions of dollars to people who were not eligible for the programs. That is, the House agreed to specific criteria for these programs, and tens of billions of dollars, according to the Auditor General, very likely went to individuals who were not eligible for those programs.
The government said that it had to get the money out quickly at the beginning, fair enough, but the bargain was that there would have to be clear, effective, after-the-fact verification in every case. Either we have to do the verification up front, which is normally what happens, or we have to do some kind of verification after the fact. However, the government has said clearly, in response to the Auditor General's recommendation, that it will not, in fact, do this verification in every case, and the minister attacked the Auditor General on this.
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- Dec/13/22 6:42:42 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, I ask my hon. colleague what the Conservatives would have done had they been in power. What approach would they have taken? The result that we see is that the country was sustained. It was sustained because of these programs. The audit work continues. Verification is being carried out. It is being carried out in multiple ways and in line with international best practices.
The member also neglects to mention that, in November 2020, in fact the Conservatives put forward an effort to delay verification and to delay the way the government would carry out that important work. I am thinking specifically of the wage subsidy here. The Conservatives want it both ways. They want to ensure that verification happens, which it is, but when they had the chance to ensure that it happened as soon as possible on the wage subsidy, they delayed it.
I ask my hon. colleague, why is that?
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- Dec/13/22 6:43:42 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, Canadians deserve transparency from the government when it comes to Beijing's interference in our elections.
That is precisely the advice that the government received from CSIS. It stated that the government's policy in response to foreign interference be guided by transparency and sunlight, and that foreign interference be made known to the public.
The approach of the Liberal government has been to do precisely the opposite of what CSIS has advised. It has been anything but transparent when it comes to the reported vast campaign of interference in the 2019 election by Beijing. The Prime Minister and ministers, for weeks, have refused to answer basic questions about what they know about this interference.
More than that, they have acted as though there is nothing to see and that there is nothing to be concerned about, except we know that is not true. There is indeed plenty to be concerned about from just the very limited disclosure that the procedure and House affairs committee has received, which is undertaking hearings around Beijing's 2019 election interference.
For example, a daily foreign intelligence brief dated February 21, 2020, prepared by the intelligence assessment secretariat of the PCO, which was disclosed to our committee yesterday and is heavily redacted, states, “Investigations into activities linked to the Canadian federal election in 2019, reveal an active foreign interference (FI) network”.
An active foreign interference network is hardly something to be brushed under the rug, yet when I asked the Minister of Intergovernmental Affairs and Minister of Foreign Affairs today at committee, they provided nothing in the way of an answer with respect to what they know about this active foreign interference network from Beijing involved in the 2019 election campaign.
Then there is a briefing to the Prime Minister from CSIS, in which there is a subheading referencing politicians and riding associations that have been targeted by foreign interference. Today when I asked the Minister of Intergovernmental Affairs about who the politicians and the riding associations were that had been targeted by foreign interference, his response was as if it was a figment of my imagination, when in fact it is in a CSIS document to the Prime Minister.
When will the Liberals finally take the advice of CSIS, be transparent and tell Canadians what they know about Beijing's campaign interference, what they know about the active foreign interference network in the 2019 election campaign and which riding associations and politicians have been targeted by foreign interference?
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- Dec/13/22 6:47:25 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, the member can rest assured that there are no cover-ups, as he has repeatedly implied in this House. At a time when democracy is being challenged around the world, Canada's electoral system remains healthy and robust. Canada continues to rank among the world's healthiest democracies, something that we can all be proud of in the House and across the country.
Members of the procedure and House affairs committee, of which the member opposite is a member, heard from the Minister of Intergovernmental Affairs earlier today, who confirmed that Canada's democracy is strong, but that does not mean there are no attempts being made to interfere in our elections. Working diligently to preserve the integrity of our elections is essential to maintaining the legitimacy, credibility and reliability of Canada's democratic processes, and interference in Canada's elections is absolutely never acceptable.
In anticipation of the 2019 election, at a time when we were witnessing increasing efforts by malicious foreign actors to undermine democracies around the world, the Government of Canada did not sit on its laurels. Rather, it rose to the challenge and took preventative action to safeguard our democratic institutions and processes. The result of such efforts took the form of the plan to protect Canada's democracy.
While this plan certainly contributes to the strength and health of our democratic institutions, we know we cannot afford to be complacent. We are aware that malicious foreign actors are consistently evolving their tactics over time as they adapt to emerging opportunities and new tools. That is why we continue to adapt our tools and approaches to ensure that our institutions are resilient to any potential threats of foreign interference.
As the Prime Minister and various ministers have repeated, the government put in place an independent process of experts, chaired by the Clerk of the Privy Council. That is something the previous government never thought important enough to do. Of course, this work needs to remain independent. That is obvious to most. It is incumbent upon all of us to recognize how important it is, given that we all have partisan interests, the member opposite and me included, that this work remain in the hands of independent people.
That group of experts is chaired by the Clerk of the Privy Council and includes the heads of Canada's security and intelligence agencies. They were given the important responsibility of ensuring that Canadian elections continue to be free and democratic. The good news, which I know will not excite the member opposite, is that experts confirmed that both elections were exactly that, free and democratic.
It is important to remember what we heard from witnesses at committee, including from Canada's Chief Electoral Officer and CSIS officials. They commented on the fact that attempts to influence democratic elections do not equate to causing actual influence, nor are they a new phenomenon in Canada or around the world. The work done by committees like NSICOP, CSIS and the national security experts strengthens the democratic process and Canada's elections, and the Conservatives are undermining this important work rather than offering a more productive contribution to the discussion of security throughout our electoral processes.
To be clear, Canada's elections are free and fair. The non-partisan national security experts who oversee these threats to our elections are confident in the results of these elections, and I would like to repeat the fact that it is in the hands of non-partisan experts, not in the hands of people with partisan interests, like the people who are elected to this House.
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- Dec/13/22 6:50:54 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, no one is contesting that the 2019 election was anything other than free and fair overall, but that does not take away the fact that there was a reported campaign of interference by Beijing. It does not take away the fact that the PCO intelligence assessment secretariat determined there to be an active foreign interference network involving Beijing in the 2019 election, and it does not take away the fact that candidates and riding associations are being targeted by foreign interference.
What is undermining Canadians' confidence in our elections and their integrity are the non-answers provided by the government. When is it going to be transparent?
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- Dec/13/22 6:51:50 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, Canadians continue to have and should have confidence in our electoral processes.
As I mentioned before, Canada's electoral system is strong. Improving, strengthening and protecting our democratic institutions against all forms of foreign interference remains our government's top priority. We have implemented a series of measures, such as the plan to protect Canada's democracy, that strengthen our response and ensure that we are equipped with the tools and mechanisms to combat electoral interference.
Our democracy remains robust, and our electoral systems are healthy. We know that malicious actors are becoming more creative at using online platforms to manipulate options, and we will continue to invest in and adapt our strategies to effectively increase transparency, authenticity and integrity in our systems. It is important, now more than ever, because the previous Conservative government did not consider it a priority.
We will also ensure that Canadians are protected from foreign interference and that our elections remain some of the most fair and free in the world, something we can all be proud of.
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- Dec/13/22 6:52:53 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, first off, I would like to give a shout-out to and acknowledge the health care workers across this country. Nurses, doctors, health care workers and health care professionals are doing such a remarkable job in such difficult circumstances right now with our health care system.
As members are well aware, what we have seen is a virtual collapse of the health care system in parts of the country. Over the course of the last few months, we have seen a situation in Ontario where the average wait time in emergency rooms is now 20 hours. That is 20 hours for patients to wait, for seniors to wait, for children to wait. In pediatric hospitals, we are seeing the same incredible length of time for people to get into the hospital. Tragically last weekend, as a family was waiting, a child died in an Ajax area hospital, reportedly because there was no access to emergency support.
In Alberta, we have seen a collapse in dozens of Alberta communities. Of course, we can say that the UCP, the Conservative government in Alberta, has an appalling disregard for the health and well-being of Albertans, just as we can blame Doug Ford in Ontario for showing an appalling disregard for the health of Ontario citizens. However, the reality is that the health care system across the country is under intense pressure. The health care professionals I mentioned earlier are the ones struggling to provide services to keep people alive and to provide the kind of medical care that Canadians deserve in this profound deterioration of health care.
What are the origins of this? Well, as we saw, the Stephen Harper government basically slashed the accelerator fund for health care in this country. There was hope back in 2015, when the new Liberal government came in, that it would reverse what was effectively a cut to health care funding. However, surprisingly to all of us and in repudiation of the commitments the Prime Minister and Liberal candidates across the country made in the 2015 election, we have not seen the Liberals reverse the Harper cuts to the accelerator clause.
Federal funding for health care in this country is at 22%, which means, as a result, that even provinces that are well meaning and want to reinforce the health care system do not have the wherewithal to do that. The NDP has put forward the proposition that we have to provide supports for health care and treat health care as the precious and valued public service that it is.
The Liberal government, within four days of COVID hitting, provided an unprecedented $750 billion in liquidity supports to Canada's big banks to maintain their profits. What the NDP members say is that the Liberal government should treat health care with more importance and with a higher priority than it treats the priorities of bank profits in this country. If three-quarters of a trillion dollars can go to bank profits, the federal government has the wherewithal to ensure adequate funding for the health care that Canadians need.
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- Dec/13/22 6:56:41 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, before I start, I feel compelled to say a few words with respect to the passing of our friend and colleague Jim Carr, the member for Winnipeg South Centre.
I was one of the members who got to sit behind the member for Winnipeg South Centre during his last speech in the House of Commons, when he spoke so eloquently about his bill to ensure the Prairies have a green economy on the horizon. It was a beautiful speech and he had a lot of emotion. It was tough to see him suffer over the last couple of years, but I know that his legacy in this place and in Winnipeg is extremely strong.
I just want to send condolences to his family, his staff, his friends, his entire riding and indeed every Canadian whom he touched with his intelligence, wisdom, compassion and legislation in this place. He will be missed.
I am grateful for the opportunity I have this evening to discuss this very important issue for Canadians. I also want to thank my friend, the hon. member, for drawing our attention to this very important subject.
We know that many hospitals in the country are experiencing extremely long wait times and they are way above capacity. Health force vacancies have almost doubled in the past two years and they have continued to climb. This is especially true of Canada's nursing workforce, where the vacancy rates reached a record high of 136,800 in the first quarter of 2022. That is up 5% from the peak in the fourth quarter of 2021. Health care workers are overworked and they do not feel supported, which has many quitting and is also likely preventing a lot of new talent from choosing that as their future career.
Our government is focusing on sustainably increasing the supply of health care workers and helping to create healthier workplaces to support the retention and mental health of health care workers. That is why budget 2022 announced $115 million over five years with $30 million ongoing to expand the foreign credential recognition program and help up to 11,000 internationally trained health care professionals per year get their credentials recognized so they will be able to work in the fields in which they are educated.
While we work on recruitment and retention of health care workers, we will also be working on improving other areas of health care to alleviate the burden in hospitals. We know that family health services are the backbone of high-performing health care systems and that some across the country are doing better than others, so ensuring the best practices are known across the country is one big part of that.
Difficulties in accessing timely family health services impacts the use of hospital services. A lot of people choose to go or are forced to go to the emergency room when there should be better services in place from a primary care perspective. For instance, in 2020, 38% of Canadians reported their last emergency department visit was for a primary care treatable condition. As a priority, we are working to improve family health care so that Canadians do not end up in the emergency room when they could have an appointment with their family doctor.
While more funding is needed, we also need to spend smarter. Canada spends more of its GDP on health care than the OECD average. We can tackle inefficiencies in the system and use innovative approaches and tools to both improve health outcomes for Canadians and also improve cost-effectiveness, because Canadians demand that of us as well.
The member opposite referenced a number that has been used a couple times by other parties. I suggest he have a conversation with his colleague from Vancouver Kingsway. We work very well together on the health committee. That number, 22% of currently allocated costs from the federal government is not correct. It is more than that. The Canada Health Act indicates that the federal government should be paying for 50% of hospital and doctor costs, and that is very close to true.
Still, health care is about more than just hospitals and doctors in 2022, so our government will continue working with provinces and territories in the coming months to tackle this crisis and to build on the investments we have made, which have been vast, to improve health care for Canadians.
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- Dec/13/22 7:00:48 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, we talk about innovation. The member for Vancouver Kingsway, the NDP health critic, has been very clear about this, as has the leader of the NDP, the member for Burnaby South.
First off, we have talked about Canada pharmacare and brought forward the Canada pharmacare act exactly for that reason. Putting in place pharmacare, as we know, provides for the bulk purchasing power that reduces the cost of drugs to the health care system. In New Zealand, some of the drugs that were referenced by their pharmacare program were reduced in cost by 90%. We brought the Canada pharmacare act forward, and the Liberals and Conservatives voted against it.
We have talked about home care, because that reduces costs as well, and enforcing the Canada Health Act is vitally important. The reality is that Conservatives are trying to burn down the health care system, and they are pyromaniacs, but Liberals are bringing the gasoline by refusing to fund the health care system adequately.
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- Dec/13/22 7:01:52 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, I strongly disagree that we are not willing to invest incrementally into the health care system, as evidenced by the past couple of years and all of the incremental funding we have dedicated to health care and preserving our robust health care system.
The health care money we send to provinces and territories ought to be spent on health care, but in provinces like mine, Ontario, a lot of that money is going to refunds for their licence plate stickers. Some of it is being used to balance the budget and create a surplus. Ontario's government is operating at a surplus right now, saying there is an emergency in the health care system.
During times of an emergency, a serious government does not run a surplus. It invests in its population, and that is what we would like to see across the country. We would like to see priorities. We have priorities around data, around human resources and health care, and around long-term care, as my colleague referenced. We have priorities to remove the backlog in the health care system and to ensure people are getting the primary care they need. We will spend money on that, not balancing the books.
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- Dec/13/22 7:02:56 p.m.
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The motion that the House do now adjourn is deemed to have been adopted. Accordingly, the House stands adjourned until tomorrow at 2 p.m. pursuant to Standing Order 24(1).
(The House adjourned at 7:03 p.m.)
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