44th Parl. 1st Sess.

February 1, 2024 10:00AM

Feb/1/24 11:39:11 a.m.
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Mr. Speaker, I felt a little uncomfortable giving a speech today. The House leader of the Bloc Québécois called me yesterday to tell me that the Conservatives would be moving a super original motion today on the carbon tax. I read the motion and told the House leader that the speech should be given by the member for Montarville, because he is the foreign affairs critic. As we know, this whole issue does not really apply to Quebec. One day we will be our own country, and we will discuss this at the UN. For the time being, we have to debate it in other people's parliaments, but this does not apply to Quebec. I see it as a diplomatic issue, and anyone who knows me well knows that I am probably not the best person to engage in diplomacy; yet here I am, rising in the House today. We are here to debate a motion that is, as usual, ridiculous. To be frank, the motion is utterly ridiculous. It is patently false. We do not know whether this motion stems from bad faith, incompetence or a combination of the two, as is often the case. The reason the Conservatives write these motions is to create an echo. It is so they can once again say that the Bloc Québécois voted in favour of the carbon tax. They are trying to create an echo, but the echo that comes from these Conservative motions is like any other echo. It is hollow. When someone stands on the edge of the Grand Canyon and shouts “hello”, it comes back as “hello, -o, -o, -o”. When we look at the Conservatives' motions, they talk about a first, second, third, fifth carbon tax. It is an echo, and it is hollow. The Conservatives started with the first one. The first one was the real carbon tax. They fell on it like rabid animals. They did not know that it did not apply to Quebec. I guess they did not have the expertise. Mistakes happen. They began to backpedal. In politics, it can be hard to admit to being wrong. In time, they came to the conclusion that it was true that it did not apply to Quebec, so there would have to be a second carbon tax. That was when they invented the second carbon tax, referring to the clean fuel regulations. Then they realized that Quebec already had its own regulations, that its regulations were already in effect, and that the federal regulations were for 2030. Nevertheless, they began saying that the price of gas would jump by 13¢ or 14¢ a litre. The price of gas did go up. Then they said that people would no longer be able to afford turkeys, so Thanksgiving would be ruined. The price of gas has dropped 20¢ since then. It even dropped on Thanksgiving. The Conservative leader and the members from Quebec were not there to say so, so the price went down. They looked silly, but they are resilient. We like them, really. They are resilient. Conservatives are tough. They figured there must be a third carbon tax coming down the pike. To hear the Conservatives talk, when I buy a piece of furniture at Ikea, it must have been made in Alberta. Everything comes from Alberta. It is transportation, it is this, it is that, only now we have the figures for inflation. Now they are interested. They talk about it all the time. Inflation is one point higher in Quebec than in Alberta, but the federal carbon tax hurts Albertans more than anyone else. Then they decided that they needed to come up with a fourth one. The fourth one was a good one. It did not last long, because we took care of it. We are onto them now. We have become experts at nipping this in the bud. The member for Charlesbourg—Haute‑Saint‑Charles is the Conservative envoy to Quebec, a future minister if ever there were one. He is the opposition leader's Louis XIV in Quebec. He is the king. He told the House that it is true that Quebec has its own emissions permit system, but it is the federal government's fault that the cost of the permits has gone up in Quebec. We want to table a document to prove that this is not true, but he is opposing that. The member for Charlesbourg—Haute‑Saint‑Charles, the Quebec lieutenant, thinks there is a correlation. To him, there are more drownings in the summer because of ice-cream sales; the two go hand in hand. That is how it works, in his mind. We explained to him that emissions permits in Quebec are issued under a government order that predates the federal carbon tax. It is a government order. It was done with California, which is 10 times bigger than we are. It is consistent with our goal of reducing our emissions by 37.5% below 1990 levels. The biggest factor driving the price of permits is demand from California. It is not that I do not like Canada, but Californians could not care less about the federal government. It is the least of their problems. They buy permits, and that has an effect on the price. That is where things stand now. The next step, the sixth carbon tax, will be a world economic forum for Freemasons. That is where things stand now. We are on the fifth or sixth carbon tax. I have lost track. I am not sure what number carbon tax we are up to. Now the carbon tax is no longer an environmental plan, but a tax plan. Incidentally, the translation is bad because the French version of the motion uses “mesure fiscale”, or tax measure, but the English one uses “tax plan”. “Tax measure” sounds milder in Quebec, whereas a “tax plan” sounds like something worth ranting about. The Conservatives are saying that the carbon tax is a tax plan. That is what the motion says. The Conservatives seem to have forgotten about the “environmental” part of environmental taxation. That is understandable because they do not see any connection between the economy and the environment, innovation, the development of new technologies and collective prosperity. The Conservatives only understand the connection between two things: extraction and extraction. They can understand that one equals one. That is easy. However, the Conservatives think taxation has no place in an environmental plan, except when they find themselves in a situation where they need tax credits for their buddies in Alberta. That, Quebeckers pay for. When the time comes for a carbon capture tax credit, when businesses need a tax credit from us, suddenly taxation is important. However, that is not a tax plan, no matter how much they rant and rave that it is. When the conversation turns to a clean technology tax credit, when the Conservatives tell us that they would like Quebeckers' taxes to be used to fund small nuclear reactors so that we can stop using gas to process oil sands and instead take that gas, pump it through new pipelines to the port in British Columbia that is nearing completion, and then sell that gas, all with the support of taxation, they do not see that as a tax plan at all. When it comes to tax credits for dirty hydrogen, which plan is it? All of a sudden, they see a connection between the environment and taxation. However, when it comes to acknowledging the science that clearly links emissions reductions with carbon pricing in other provinces, when it comes to the system we have in Quebec, which uses very robust empirical evaluations, when it comes to the regime in British Columbia, when we know that trading emissions permits with Europe and the United States works, when it is time to acknowledge the science, the Conservatives absolutely never agree. They say it is a tax plan. These are Conservatives who supposedly have faith in the market. The people on the right say the market works. The market sets a price, and people react to that price, until the environment is involved, that is. Then, suddenly, economics 101 goes by the board. What do the Conservatives support time after time, especially the ones from Quebec whom we never see talking about this? Maybe it is because they are too embarrassed. Maybe it is because they are working on the eighth, ninth or tenth carbon tax, working ahead so they can give us all of them at once. What they support is a plan to help oil companies by taxing Quebeckers. As I have said, they are compulsive taxers. We are talking $83 billion in subsidies for Alberta oil companies, paid for by Quebeckers through their taxes. Meanwhile, we have people waiting in hospital hallways and we are asking for way less than that in health transfers, but where are the Quebec Conservatives? They are nowhere to be seen. They are hiding. We do not see them. Immigration and taking care of irregular migrants has cost Quebec $470 million, and the feds are supposed to cover that, yet they say they are going to give Quebec a mere $100 million and will not be paying Quebec's debt. None of the Quebec Conservatives are standing up because no expense is too great for oil companies, but any expense is too great when it comes to taking care of Quebeckers. The Quebec Conservatives all think that they are going to become ministers. I do not know what they will be ministers of, and I would not want to be the one who has to make those decisions, but I will say that Quebeckers will have to pay dearly for those members' cabinet seats. The Conservatives have already started to abandon Quebeckers. They are good at that. I want to remind the House of a deadline that is coming up, when we will have to explain our platforms to Quebeckers and justify our actions to them. The Bloc Québécois will be able to say that we have been completely trustworthy. Quebeckers are going to listen to what I just said about the Conservatives because they are a lot smarter than the members on this side of the House think.

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