SoVote

Context: House Hansard - 270 - Jan/29/24

Mr. Jagmeet Singh (Burnaby South, NDP)

Jan/29/24 2:31:27 p.m.
Watch

Mr. Speaker, things have gotten bad, really bad. The City of Edmonton had to declare a housing and homeless emergency. The Conservatives are laughing about homeless people and a housing crisis, but Toronto had to declare one as well. Again, we hear the Conservatives laughing because they have no concern for people who are struggling with housing or who are homeless. The Liberal government does not care either. The Liberals have been in power for nine years, and they do not get it. The Prime Minister does not get it, the Liberal minister in Edmonton does not get it and the 24 Liberal MPs in Toronto do not get it. Why does this government wait until things are at a breaking point before acting? Some hon. members: Oh, oh!

129 words

Context: House Hansard - 270 - Jan/29/24

Mr. Jagmeet Singh (Burnaby South, NDP)

Jan/29/24 2:33:06 p.m.
Watch

Mr. Speaker, the Prime Minister just does not get it. Surprise, surprise, the Prime Minister has broken another promise. While the country's renoviction rate is at an all-time high, he is refusing to take on the big investors as he promised to do. Why does the Prime Minister say one thing on the campaign trail and then defend his friends' profits once in power?

66 words

Context: House Hansard - 270 - Jan/29/24

Mr. Jagmeet Singh (Burnaby South, NDP)

Jan/29/24 3:19:33 p.m.
Watch

Mr. Speaker, I want to begin by extending my condolences on behalf of all New Democrats to all those who loved Ed Broadbent: his partner, Frances, his family and his many friends. I also want to take a moment to thank the Prime Minister and Canadian Heritage for yesterday's state funeral. It was a fitting tribute to Ed and his incredible life, and I want to thank everyone who helped organize it and participated, particularly the Broadbent Institute. I shared this story at the funeral, and I will share it again. Every time I was at an event with Ed, I could see him in the crowd when I was speaking, and I would always take a moment to invite people to applaud the legendary Ed Broadbent. I am not sure he always wanted that type of attention, but I did it anyway. I also took a moment to say, looking him right in the eyes, “Ed, you are who I want to be when I grow up.” Ed, as a very generous and compassionate person, would laugh as if it was the first time I had said it. Initially it was maybe a bit tongue in cheek, but every time I said it, I meant it more and more. I wish and I hope Ed knew how much I meant that. The reason I meant that I wanted to be Ed when I grew up was that I looked at Ed's life, and he had spent it in public service. He committed his life to a clear vision of building a fair, more equitable world. He believed in that vision with his entire heart, and he dedicated his life to that vision. If we look at what he did, he was elected as a member of Parliament from the auto worker town of Oshawa by a huge margin of 15 votes. When he won, he went on to run and win as leader and then served for almost a decade and a half as the leader of the party. That would be a great political journey and was a significant contribution, and he could have called it a career, but that was not enough for him. After having served as leader and retired, many years later he was asked to run again. Folks in the House will understand what it is like to be a previous leader and be asked to run again. However, he agreed, under Jack Layton, to run again, and he won a seat in Ottawa Centre as a member of Parliament once again. When he finally took his retirement, again one would say he had done his service. He had fought for working-class people the way he wanted to. However, it was not enough for him. Most of us could think of lots of ways to spend our retirement, but in his retirement, Ed then founded an institute in his name. He did not just found the Broadbent Institute; he was an active participant, constantly finding ways to push forward and grow the institute so that it could be a place for working-class people, a place for activists and a place to train the future leadership of the movement. He was persistent in his clear pursuit of a vision of social democracy, but that is not all: On top of being very active with the institute he founded, most recently he wrote a book, again laying out his vision for social democracy. This is why Ed is who I want to be when I grow up; he never stopped giving back, and he dedicated his life to a vision of a better world. He made it clear what a better world would look like. Ed Broadbent believed in democracy, but for him democracy was not just the idea of having the right to vote; the political right or the civic right was not sufficient, not good enough. One also had to have the true elements of democracy, meaning people needed to have economic equality, economic justice. That meant we needed to have the right to vote but also to be able to earn a good living, to be able to have a safe place to call home, to be able to get to and from the polling station in safety and to be able to participate meaningfully in society. He was a true believer in democracy, in all of its elements. Ed also made it clear that he was not satisfied with New Democrats just being the conscience of Parliament. He made it absolutely clear that he wanted to be prime minister. He believed that we needed to use our power in this place to make life better for working people. Ed Broadbent believed that the government's power needed to be used for good, to deal with the most powerful and protect the most vulnerable. He believed that we needed to ensure that Ottawa was working for the people and not for the billionaires. He did not just want to be Parliament's conscience. He wanted to be Prime Minister. He did not engage in a false debate over whether to choose between respecting his principles and winning elections. He thought that it was necessary to do both. In fact, the only way to win was to show Canadians a policy based on principles that put their interests first. As we mourn the loss of Ed Broadbent, we are also committed to pursuing his work. His legacy is the conviction that Canada can and must do better. I want to talk a bit more of the legacy that he left behind. Back in 1989, almost 35 years ago, in the chamber, he put forward a motion to rid Canada of child poverty. At the time, nearly a million kids in our country were suffering child poverty. He thought that, in a country as rich as ours, that should not be the case. That was something he put forward, and it was voted on unanimously. I think many people thought it was just a proposition or a values statement, but for Ed, he believed fundamentally that that is the work of government, to make sure people are protected and to use the power we have to lift up the people around us. Sadly, there have been some advances, but there have also been a lot of steps back. To this day, right now, there are still a million kids that, according to many reports, are living in poverty. UNICEF put out a report that for the first time, in 2021, the rate or number of children in child poverty was increasing. This should give us some serious pause. It really reminds us that the legacy of Ed Broadbent's work is that we must continue to fight hard. Another thing about Ed is that he would never have said that Canada is broken. He would say that Canada needs to do more, can do a lot more and must do more to lift up the people around us. He was committed to that.

1184 words

Context: House Hansard - 270 - Jan/29/24

Mr. Jagmeet Singh

Jan/29/24 3:26:54 p.m.
Watch

Ed Broadbent fundamentally believed in the power of persuasion to see the better way forward, and that we should never stop listening to each other, even if we disagreed. He was not afraid to fight. He would take on a fight directly with political opponents, but he was also someone who was known for his ability to work together with people, to find the common ground to work together to build a brighter future for everyone. He believed fundamentally that we needed to lift up wages. He spoke about not just the rights of women but the economic rights of women many years ago, when it maybe was not as common for people to bring that up. He reminded us of our fundamental commitment to indigenous people, something that remained a major priority throughout his life. Ed spoke to me on a number of occasions and, as a new leader of a political party, one that he was such a legend in, I have to thank him from the bottom of my heart for something that he did that was very special to me. Maybe when I was elected as leader I was not what people imagined when they thought about what a leader would look like. When I was first elected, finally, as a member of Parliament and was formally introduced in our caucus meeting, Ed Broadbent was there. He wanted to use the respect that he had gained, not just in the New Democratic Party, but across the country, to say, as he stood beside me, that, yes, I belonged. I thank him to this day for that generosity. In fact, any time I asked Ed for help, he always said yes, whether it was providing advice, meeting up for lunch, coming to introduce me at caucus or campaigning in the Lansdowne farmers' market, he was there for me. I cannot imagine what that meant for someone who at that age could have been doing so many other things with his time. For him mentor a young leader again shows that generosity of spirit, his willingness to continue to give back. I hope that in the future I can give back, even to a small degree, the way he did throughout his life. I also want to reflect on the advice he gave me about the supply and confidence agreement. He was very proud of the work that we did. He told me he was proud of the dental care program, that it was in the tradition of Tommy Douglas to make sure people had access to dental care. He was proud of it. However, he was concerned about a number of things. He was concerned, and in the very New Democratic tradition, he wanted us to do more, and he wanted it to be faster. He was also very concerned about the Liberals. He did not want them to be let off the hook. I promised him that I would make sure I did all those things. I want say a big thank you to Ed. I want him to know that we will not let him down. We will keep on fighting for that vision of the more equitable society that he believed in. We have done lots of work. We are going to keep on fighting. Ed is still who I want to be when I grow up.

563 words