SoVote

May/9/23 12:05:00 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, I want to commend my colleague from La Prairie for the tone and mood of his speech. He addressed serious topics, but he found a way to make it fun to listen to. He is a talented speaker who should inspire many. I really like listening to him in the House. A few days ago, the Prime Minister stated that he was not aware of the threats and intimidation that the hon. member for Wellington—Halton Hills had been facing for the last two years. Soon after, we learned that he may have been aware and that his entourage was aware. In short, all this is unclear. However, CSIS was well aware of this information and did its duty by notifying the Prime Minister's Office. My question for my colleague is as follows: Does he feel that this government is listening to the agencies, especially CSIS, the way it should, or is it operating in isolation? Is CSIS just there for decoration?

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Context: House Hansard - 193 - May/9/23

Mr. Martin Champoux (Drummond, BQ)

May/9/23 2:02:50 p.m.
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Mr. Speaker, today I want to highlight the extraordinary honour recently bestowed upon Quebec poet David Goudreault, who now has his own entry in the dictionary. The team at Petit Robert chose to add an entry about the slam poet from Sherbrooke in its literature and philosophy category, a commendable decision indeed. The dictionary will describe him as an ardent defender of the French language in his performances, poems and novels, adding that he is profoundly inspired by real life and unflinchingly describes marginalized people and the absurdity of society. Goudreault is not the only new entry from Quebec in the dictionary, which will now include some of our homegrown terms, such as “mégenrer”, to misgender, “complosphère”, the conspiracy community, and “infonuagique”, the cloud. Speaking of clouds, David Goudreault is currently on cloud nine at the news that he will be in the Petit Robert. He will feel right at home surrounded by the things he loves, plays with and uses to express himself: words.

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Context: House Hansard - 193 - May/9/23

Mr. Martin Champoux (Drummond, BQ)

May/9/23 9:23:21 p.m.
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Mr. Speaker, I was looking forward to my turn to speak. I want to congratulate the member for Abbotsford on his speech. The current chair of the Pierre Elliott Trudeau Foundation appeared today before the Standing Committee on Access to Information, Privacy and Ethics. Here is another example of someone willing to testify about this foundation who either has no conscience or has done very little self-reflection. Perhaps it would help him to have a conscience if he took a look, hard look in the mirror. That said, Mr. Johnson appeared before the committee and said that everything was fine. There was never a threat of interference. CSIS had never sounded the alarm or warned of any risk of Chinese interference through the foundation. He found a way to throw former CEO Pascale Fournier under the bus. He denied just about everything she said. He also lambasted the media. Edward Johnson was a member of Pierre Elliott Trudeau's team in the early 1980s. He was also a senior executive at Power Corporation. Obviously, he is not the kind of person who likes to pull strings and stay close to the circles of power. I found it interesting that he was lambasting the media for their work on this. I would like to ask my Conservative colleague if the Conservative Party sees that as a good opportunity to ensure that Canada's news media is well protected by robust laws so that we have quality journalism and support journalists in this investigative work.

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Context: House Hansard - 193 - May/9/23

Mr. Martin Champoux (Drummond, BQ)

May/9/23 9:55:34 p.m.
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Mr. Speaker, I want to pick up on what my colleague from Longueuil—Saint-Hubert was saying. He talked about getting the sense that people are wearing rose-coloured glasses, but I am getting the sense that people are worried. I am concerned about how the government is handling issues that are more serious than pretty much anything we have ever seen. I remember the WE scandal from a few years ago. The government did all it could to cover everything up, to sweep things under the rug over and over until hard-working reporters and opposition members managed to uncover the details. It was appalling. It was even worse than everyone thought initially. Now we have these allegations of Chinese interference. The more we dig, the more outrageous things we find, yet the Liberals and their Trudeau Foundation friends keep burying their heads in the sand. They act like nothing happened and they never do anything wrong, but actually, something very serious happened. The government needs to be transparent and collaborate to get this all out in the open and reassure people. The whole situation is extremely worrisome. I would like my colleague to comment on that.

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