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Mr. Michael Kram (Regina—Wascana, CPC)

Feb/5/24 4:59:45 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, I remember when President Zelenskyy was addressing Parliament last September. I paid very close attention to his speech. When I checked Twitter that evening, it seemed that the member for Kingston and the Islands was not paying attention to the speech; rather, he was recording a video of the leader of the official opposition and making fun of him for the way he was clapping. Could the member for Kingston and the Islands explain to Parliament how his actions have helped promote public support for Ukraine?

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Mr. Mark Gerretsen

Feb/5/24 5:00:30 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, I can confirm that I definitely shared that video. However, I did not record it. I will say this: I find it very interesting that the member wants to talk about what the Leader of the Opposition was doing at the time when the President of Ukraine was here. Do members know that the Leader of the Opposition never once mentioned on his Twitter, Facebook or Instagram feed, or anywhere, that the President of Ukraine was here? He did not make a single reference. As a matter of fact, it was almost like an act of defiance. The member for Calgary Nose Hill had to go back a year to retweet and repost what the Leader of the Opposition had said when the President of Ukraine appeared before us virtually. This is the narrative I am talking about, of trying to deceive and suggest something else is going on. I am sure that, within their caucus meetings, they have had to battle the member for Selkirk—Interlake—Eastman on it. He is in the front row now, but he was not before Christmas. I am sure that was the trade-off to get him to be quiet. The reality of the situation is that Conservatives have been against Ukraine because they do not support Ukraine.

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Mr. Yves Perron (Berthier—Maskinongé, BQ)

Feb/5/24 5:01:48 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, I share my colleague's disdain for the Conservatives' position. It is deplorable. However, as long as we are discussing the free trade agreement, we should discuss its contents. I would like to hear him comment on a section of this agreement that still allows private companies to sue governments on the ground that they are preventing these companies from fully capitalizing on their investments. The Bloc Québécois considers this problematic, and we believe that a committee should be struck to work on it. Would the member agree that we should study this issue in detail to prevent private companies from being able to sue governments under free trade agreements?

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Mr. Mark Gerretsen

Feb/5/24 5:02:23 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, I would say that, with the amount of time that the Conservatives have spent holding up this piece of legislation, we have had the opportunity to study it thoroughly. The member is right about one thing: It is going to provide private companies the opportunity to work on and to build infrastructure in Ukraine. That is why the Ukrainians and the President of Ukraine are so interested in this deal. He knows he is going to win this war, and he wants to have the necessary tools in place when that happens to start rebuilding the country. This is going to involve investment from outside countries in terms of rebuilding infrastructure. That is where we have the opportunity. This is the trade-off for Canada that will position us well to be part of that rebuilding process of Ukraine.

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Ms. Lori Idlout (Nunavut, NDP)

Feb/5/24 5:03:15 p.m.
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Uqaqtittiji, if Parliament were to swallow the amendment like a pill, what would the member say the side effects would be?

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Mr. Mark Gerretsen

Feb/5/24 5:03:36 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, we voted on the amendment earlier today. The amendment the Conservatives tried to put forward was defeated, and now we are back to talking about the bill without the amendment. I am sorry if that is not what the member was referring to. However, we need to pass this legislation, and the only thing that is really troubling when it comes to it is the fact that it is not unanimous. It should and could easily have been unanimous. This narrative about a carbon tax in here and how that is somehow impacting it is a complete red herring, nothing more, nothing less. It is very unfortunate that the House will not pass this bill unanimously. However, I think that Canadians will remember and that the Conservatives will be held accountable for their vote on it.

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Mr. Garnett Genuis (Sherwood Park—Fort Saskatchewan, CPC)

Feb/5/24 5:04:31 p.m.
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Re: Bill C-57

Madam Speaker, sometimes when I rise in the House I say I have a tough act to follow. However, that is not the case today. I am speaking to Bill C-57, which would implement the agreement that the government negotiated with Ukraine. As has been the case throughout this debate, I will make some general reflections on Conservative support for Ukraine, but it is important to underline that these are two distinct issues. There is the question of whether and how we should support Ukraine, and Conservatives are firmly in favour of supporting Ukraine, and then there is the question of the particular provisions of Bill C-57. Bill C-57 is not a kind of in-a-vacuum endorsement of a relationship with a particular country. Bill C-57 would implement a specific trade deal with specific provisions. Members opposite have said virtually nothing during this entire debate about the provisions in this legislation, about what this deal would actually commit Canada and Ukraine to. I will read the section that is a matter of contention directly from the agreement. It states, “Consistent with Article 13.24, the Parties shall cooperate bilaterally and in international forums to address matters of mutual interest, as appropriate, to”, and then a list follows. I will jump to item (h), which says, “promote carbon pricing and measures to mitigate carbon leakage risks”. That is right in the text of the agreement, “promote carbon pricing and measures to mitigate carbon leakage risks”. In speech after speech, members of the government ask where the carbon price is. It is right in the deal that they signed, so let us not pretend that it is not in there, because any Canadian can go online, find the agreement and find this provision, “promote carbon pricing and measures to mitigate carbon leakage risks”. I have a sense that Liberals do not actually take their word or commitments very seriously. We have seen that over the last eight years. The way they approach this deal is to say that it is only words. They ask why Conservatives care so much. Conservatives take our word seriously. We take documents we sign on to seriously, and we aspire to be people of integrity, so when we see something in a trade agreement that we profoundly disagree with, that is going to impact how we vote on that agreement. When we are committed to a national campaign to axe the tax, when one of our key priorities is axing the tax, when we have assured Canadians that we will axe the tax, it would be a bit of a problem if we just shrugged off a line in an international agreement that would oblige us to “promote carbon pricing and measures to mitigate carbon leakage risks”. It seems fairly basic that we would note what is in the agreement, evaluate the agreement on the basis of what is in it and then make a decision accordingly while, on the separate point of support for Ukraine, being very clear that the Conservative Party strongly supports Ukraine. It is true that the Government of Ukraine takes a different view of this agreement than Conservatives do, but there are innumerable issues on which the government has previously taken a different view from the Government of Ukraine, including in the midst of the war, in which it has ignored the express priorities of the Government of Ukraine. In fact, as I will get to, there is one instance in which the Government of Ukraine was so upset about a decision of the Prime Minister's that the Canadian ambassador was summoned. That is an unprecedented step. I think it is the first time in the history of Canada-Ukraine relations that the Canadian ambassador to Ukraine was summoned as a result of displeasure about the way the Government of Ukraine believed the Liberal government was undermining a global united front in support of Ukraine. The Liberals want us to forget about that by saying this is the most important issue. It is fairly obvious, listening to what the Ukrainian government says, that although we do have a disagreement over certain provisions of this trade agreement, the most important thing to the Government of Ukraine is not the free trade deal but the provisions that we need to undertake to support Ukraine in its victory. Conservatives have been clear and consistent in our support for Ukraine. Let me underline the things we have done and advocated for in the process. Of course, the invasion of Ukraine by the Putin regime did not start in February 2022. It began back in 2014, when Conservatives were in power, and then prime minister Stephen Harper led the G7 in isolating Russia and applying critical sanctions. Canadian leadership, under then prime minister Stephen Harper, was recognized and was critical to driving a consensus that, as then prime minister Harper said, “Whether it takes five months or 50 years,” we would defend the territorial integrity of Ukraine. This is a commitment Conservatives carry forward. As soon as Liberals took office, they started backing away from that commitment. I recall in this place challenging then foreign affairs minister Stéphane Dion, who made the decision to cancel the sharing of satellite imagery associated with RADARSAT. Members will remember that Ukraine was still then at war with Russia, and Canada, under then prime minister Stephen Harper, was sharing satellite images with Ukraine that were useful as part of the war effort. In an effort to appease the Putin regime, Liberal minister Stéphane Dion cancelled the sharing of those satellite images. Where was the member for Kingston and the Islands when that happened? He was more silent then than he is now. Frankly, I would prefer a more silent member, compared to what we get now, but the point is that all of these members who are now eagerly wrapping themselves in blue and yellow had nothing to say when Liberal foreign affairs minister Stéphane Dion cancelled RADARSAT image sharing. We consistently advocated for tough sanctions against the Putin regime. We were standing up in this House for stronger measures prior to the further invasion of two Februaries ago. We were saying that pre-emptively, if the government was ready to apply tougher sanctions, it could be a force of deterrence against the Putin regime. We were calling for the sharing of lethal weapons with our Ukrainian allies prior to the invasion, so they could get ready. One does not have to take my word for it. One can find the quotations of members opposite speaking against that. The member for Edmonton Strathcona, the NDP foreign affairs critic, explicitly opposed the sharing of lethal weapons prior to the further invasion of February 2022. We were calling for tougher sanctions earlier, and Liberals and New Democrats were opposing those measures. That is the reality; it is on the record. There were other initiatives. We put forward a motion in this House after the further invasion started, to allow visa-free travel for Ukrainians fleeing the war. Actually, at that time it was the Conservatives, the Bloc and the NDP who came together and adopted that motion calling for visa-free travel, but the government refused to implement that proposal. We were calling for more generous immigration measures. Of course, one key area where we have led on this side of the House is energy calls. We have long recognized that Canada has a special vocation in the democratic world. Many of our democratic allies and partners, in both Europe and the Asia-Pacific, are geographically small and densely populated nations that need to import energy resources. Canada is relatively unique in the democratic world as a geographically vast, more sparsely populated nation with an abundance of natural resources. We need to develop and export those resources, not merely as a matter of our own economic interest but as a matter of providing the democratic world with the energy security it requires. We have made this case consistently. We have said that Canada has a role and a responsibility, again, not only to create jobs and opportunity for Canadian workers but, in this new cold war reality, to provide our allies and partners with the energy security they need, so they can stand with us for the long haul, defending freedom and justice. When our European partners and our Asia-Pacific partners are reliant on energy from dictatorships, from hostile regimes that do not share our values, it has the effect of weakening our collective resolve and it pours money into the coffers of hostile anti-democratic regimes. It is a security imperative for Canada to develop our energy resources, but the Liberal government has said there is not a business case for that. Of course there is a business case, but there is not, in its mind, an ideological case. It is far more concerned about according with its ideology than it is with the realities of the business case. What the government has done since the further invasion of Ukraine by Russia, rather than support the rapid increase and development of Canada's energy resources to fuel the efforts of our European allies to find energy security, and rather than develop Canadian resources, is to grant a sanctions waiver to allow the export of turbines from Canada to facilitate the export of Russian gas to Europe. Is that not incredible? This government, when it could have been creating jobs and opportunities for Canadian workers and securing energy security, chose to grant a waiver to allow turbines from Canada to facilitate the export of Russian gas to Europe. It was doing more to export Russian gas to Europe and increase that dependency rather than export Canadian gas. This was the instance in which the Ukrainian government and President Zelenskyy spoke out against what this government was doing. He spoke out clearly and decisively. He summoned the Canadian ambassador to Ukraine. This was particularly important for Ukraine, not only because of the facts of the case, but also because of how Canada, in granting exceptions to sanctions, was seen as creating a dangerous precedent. As we heard at the foreign affairs committee, when we say we are imposing sanctions and then we turn those sanctions into Swiss cheese by granting convenient exceptions, and when every country says, “Well, we're going to impose sanctions but we're going to have this and that exception,” very quickly we do not have a sanctions regime worth the name. This government, then, was undermining that sanctions unity and undermining the opportunity to fuel European energy security, and Conservatives fought back. Conservatives called for special hearings at the foreign affairs committee. We gathered in the summer, we summoned witnesses, we pressed the government hard and we pursued this matter in the face of Liberal filibusters through the fall until we were finally able to force it to reverse course. Conservatives are very proud of that accomplishment and of holding this government's feet to the fire. In every instance, where the government has been weak on supporting Ukraine, whether it has been cancelling rare sat-tech image sharing, whether it has been failing to apply the appropriate sanctions, whether it has been its rejection of our proposals on visa-free travel or whether it has been our championing of energy security, we have always been pushing the government to do far more to support our friends and allies in Ukraine, and this has continued to the present day. When Bill C-57 came before committee, notwithstanding our concerns about the bill, we did try to improve it. Conservatives put forward many amendments that would add specific provisions to Bill C-57 to deal with getting weapons to Ukraine. Ukraine has been very clear about this, that what Ukraine needs to win this war is weapons. Many have said, and rightly so, that we must be with Ukraine for as long as possible. I agree that we must be with Ukraine for as long as possible, and we must also help Ukraine win victory as quickly as possible, because when the Liberals say they will be there for as long as possible but then take as long as possible to actually deliver the support that is required, well, that is not doing much good, is it? Let us be there for as long as possible and let us deliver the vital, necessary aid as quickly as possible. Let us do both, as long as possible and as quickly as possible, so that Ukraine can secure a clear victory faster. What we have seen throughout the course of this war is that delays in delivering essential weaponry have allowed the Russian army to further entrench its defensive positions. If only the western world had stepped up to quickly deliver vitally important weapons and defence systems right out of the gate, then Ukraine would be in a much better position. Of course, Ukrainians have fought heroically, but we must have their backs, not only with words but with deeds, not only with photo ops and announcements but by actually delivering Ukraine the weapons that it requires. I put forward amendments to the bill at committee that would have done a number of things. The amendments that I put forward on behalf of the Conservative caucus would have established a legal requirement for the federal government to create a long-term plan to increase defence production, with a particular emphasis on defence supplies required by the armed forces of Ukraine and the Canadian Armed Forces. The amendments would have established a legal requirement for the Minister of National Defence to periodically review Canada's inventory of military equipment and offer to donate to Ukraine any military equipment that is surplus or is no longer useful to Canada. The amendments would have added Ukraine to the list of open-policy countries eligible for expedited review of arms exports, significantly reducing the time required for review before arms can be shipped to Ukraine. Finally, through those amendments, we sought to require EDC and BDC to support investments aimed at developing Ukraine's domestic munitions manufacturing industries. If Conservatives were in government, we would have negotiated a better free trade deal that would have included provisions like this to actually get Ukraine the weapons it needs, instead of putting the emphasis on “carbon pricing and measures to mitigate carbon leakage risks”. Whether it is on the issue of blocking Canadian energy development or putting divisive carbon tax measures into the agreement, we see how Liberal radical ideology seeps into everything they do and gets in the way of doing the right thing to support Ukraine. Conservatives would have zeroed in on the essential needs of Ukraine. If we were in government, we would have negotiated and proposed a better deal that would have been good for Canada, good for Ukraine and that would have focused on delivering weapons. Sadly, all the amendments I put forward at committee were opposed and blocked by the NDP-Liberal coalition. They opposed our efforts to get those weapons to Ukraine through the amendments that we proposed. What a shame. We have persisted. This past Friday, in fact, the Conservative leader announced a proposal calling on the government to transfer rockets to Ukraine. These are rockets that the government has slated for disposal. We think a better way to dispose of them is to give them to Ukraine so they could drop them on the Russians. In fact, our analyses show that giving these weapons to Ukraine would be less costly than disposing of them here. What has stopped the government from doing this? It is hard to explain. We can see a myriad of announcements made by the government regarding Ukraine and no action. It is A for announcements and F for follow-through. The Liberals talk about solidarity, but they fail to deliver. This is consistent with the government's approach across the board. It wants to use this issue to create division in the House, but it has failed to actually deliver on the weapons. I would like to briefly say a couple of additional things about support for Ukraine. It is so important that all of us come together to support Ukraine. When I have conversations with people about this, some of them ask questions. They ask if it is a complicated situation. It is not a complicated situation. It is an entirely uncomplicated situation. It is the most uncomplicated situation one could imagine. The Government of Russia chose to invade another sovereign state in order to try to steal its territory. It did so after signing an agreement, the Budapest memorandum, that committed it to recognizing Ukraine's territorial integrity. It signed a binding international agreement recognizing Ukraine's territorial integrity. It broke that agreement by invading in order to steal territory. This is clearly the kind of precedent we cannot allow. If we allow it, it will create a more dangerous world. Ukraine can win and will win with the support of the west, the consistent, persistent, steadfast support of the west. We must be there to back Ukrainians up, and that does not just mean making announcements. It means delivering the weapons, because to win a war, one needs weapons, not announcements. I challenge the Liberal government to put actions behind its words. This is not just about territory. The choice between living in Ukraine and living in Russia is not just a matter of what state they are in; it is a choice about the kind of political system they have. Ukraine is a free society, where people can choose who they associate with, what they say, what they believe and how they worship. In Russia, every person is completely beholden to and dependent on the state. In Russian-occupied Ukraine, we are seeing the mass stealing of children. It is a brutal story of the systematic abduction of Ukrainian children, forced into propaganda programs and, in many case, used as soldiers against Ukraine. The choice is not only about territory or what state people are in, but also about the kind of system they live in. That is why Ukrainians are prepared to fight and to die for their freedom for as long as it takes. Let us be with them as long as it takes, but let us help them win as quickly as possible with weapons.

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Mr. Mark Gerretsen (Kingston and the Islands, Lib.)

Feb/5/24 5:24:39 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, if we are to believe what the member just said, if we are to believe that this free trade agreement is only about the price on pollution and if we are to believe that, other than that, Conservatives completely and fully support Ukraine, can the member explain why, when his party separated 138 items on a budget, he and his Conservative colleagues voted against supporting Ukraine for Operation Unifier and Operation Reassurance? They voted against the military. What people are going to hear from them is that those were confidence votes, and they always vote against the government on a confidence vote. I have news for them: They could have voted for just those two items and still could have had 136 other opportunities to vote on confidence. Why could they not have brought themselves to vote for just those two issues with respect to supporting Ukraine if there was not more to it than what he is proposing?

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Mr. Garnett Genuis

Feb/5/24 5:25:43 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, let us be clear: What the member opposite is doing is quite malicious. What he is trying to do is to exploit situations where people may not understand details of our parliamentary procedure to create a false impression about where Conservatives stand on the issue.

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Mr. Mark Gerretsen

Feb/5/24 5:25:59 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, on a point of order, he is saying that I am trying to be malicious, and members are not supposed to infer that any member is not acting in an honourable way. If the member is saying that I am being malicious just because I am pointing out what he did, then he should just answer the question.

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Malicious

The Assistant Deputy Speaker (Mrs. Alexandra Mendès)

Feb/5/24 5:26:16 p.m.
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It is a point of order because it is an inference of intent. I actually did react right away to the hon. member's use of the word. Therefore, I recommend that a more judicious wording would be appropriate.

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Mr. Garnett Genuis

Feb/5/24 5:26:29 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, I would have expected a thicker skin from that member, especially given what he says about other members. Here is the point: He is, through this line of argumentation, trying to exploit what may be a gap in some people's understanding of the mechanics of the parliamentary process. The way the process works is that when we are voting non-confidence in the government, we are voting non-confidence in the government. Through that vote, we are expressing the fact that we do not have confidence in the government. Of course, if we go through the budget, we would find there are specific measures we would maintain, and there are specific measures we would change or alter in some way, naturally. We have been clear, and we will continue to be clear that we do not have confidence in the NDP-Liberal coalition. We do not have confidence in it because of the damage it is doing in this country and, in part, because of its failure to actually deliver the support Ukraine requires.

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Mr. Luc Desilets (Rivière-des-Mille-Îles, BQ)

Feb/5/24 5:27:31 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, the Conservatives are being disruptive, and not necessarily in a good way. They are relentlessly harping on the carbon tax, almost to the point of obsession, and that makes me worry for the future. If that party takes power in Canada, how is Canada going to be able to sign even the simplest little international treaty? What will international relations with the rest of the world be like? I am worried about that, because we have before us an incredibly simple bill. I wanted to comment on that.

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Mr. Garnett Genuis

Feb/5/24 5:28:16 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, the member is asking how a Conservative government would possibly carry out international relations if it does not sign agreements that include a carbon tax. It is very simple: We will not sign agreements that include a carbon tax. We will negotiate to ensure that agreements we sign do not include a carbon tax. In this particular case, I think it would be very simple. I have no proof of this, but I suspect that this provision on carbon pricing and carbon leakage is only in this agreement because the Government of Canada wanted it to be in there for political reasons. If we had a Conservative government and a Conservative trade minister saying that we actually did not want a carbon tax in the agreement, I suspect the government of Ukraine would say it was no problem and let us focus on getting weapons into the hands of soldiers who need them to defend their country. I think that standing up for our principles at home and abroad will be entirely uncomplicated for international relations.

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Carbon

Ms. Lisa Marie Barron (Nanaimo—Ladysmith, NDP)

Feb/5/24 5:29:15 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, I keep coming back to something in these debates, and it is just so disheartening. I do not understand it. This is not a debate about the carbon tax. This is a debate about the fact that the leader of Ukraine has asked us to sign this agreement to see that Ukrainians get the help they need. I am hearing from Ukrainians who are being forced to flee their country. They are coming to Canada. The commitment I made to them is that I would do all that I could, in my position, to fight for the rights of Ukrainians at this time. Can the member share why this is turning into a political issue for the Conservatives, when Ukrainians and the leader of Ukraine are asking for this to be put through?

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Mr. Garnett Genuis

Feb/5/24 5:30:06 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, that is an interesting question. If the member is serious about supporting Ukraine and all of its needs, I wish it were her and not her NDP colleague who had been on the committee at the time we considered my amendments. When I put forward my amendments, which would have facilitated more weapons going to Ukraine, the NDP joined with the Liberals in order to block those amendments from going forward. It was her colleague from Edmonton Strathcona who spoke out against giving lethal weapons to Ukraine. The NDP record, in terms of giving weapons to Ukrainian soldiers, is decidedly terrible. I would like us to come together in the House. I would add as well that the NDP has a long history of opposing trade deals. In the past, the NDP has always opposed trade deals. I would never say that because it opposed a trade deal with another country, it does not like, does not support or does not want to have good relations with the country. I respect the fact that New Democrats have come to different conclusions than I have about trade in general, which is why they generally vote against trade deals. However, I think they would understand that anytime we consider a trade deal, we have to consider the particulars of what is in the trade deal. We cannot just say that we like the country with which it is negotiated, so we will pass it. We have to look at the details.

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Hon. Mike Lake (Edmonton—Wetaskiwin, CPC)

Feb/5/24 5:31:27 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, the Conservative Party position has consistently been to vehemently oppose a carbon tax, so it is not surprising that we would oppose a carbon tax in a trade deal. What is surprising is the consistent and deliberate pro-Russian energy policy of the Liberal Party. Because we cannot build a pipeline in this country, we imported $400 million of Russian natural gas into Canada in 2021 because of a pro-Russian Liberal energy policy. I wonder if the member can comment on the impact that unwillingness to sell Canadian oil and gas to the international market has on Russian sales of oil and gas around the world.

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Mr. Garnett Genuis

Feb/5/24 5:32:24 p.m.
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Mr. Speaker, my colleague is right, of course, that Canada produces commodities that Russia also produces, so we are in a unique position to displace those commodities. We are in a relatively unique position to reduce the world's dependence on Russian oil and gas. It is not just Russia. We could give many examples of dictator oil around the world. We could talk about the Burmese regime and how the government's failure to apply sanctions on the Burmese junta, consistent with what our American ally has done, is allowing investments in the Burmese energy sector, which are fuelling that country's campaign of aggression against its own population. In many of these cases, we see how the Liberal government is willing to turn a blind eye to the advancement of dictator oil instead of supporting Canadian energy development. It makes no sense. Canadian energy development is good for Canadian workers and the Canadian economy, but, more importantly, it is good for the advancement of peace, justice and freedom around the world. If we could do something that is good for Canadian workers and good for the advancement of peace, freedom and justice around the world, it is a no-brainer, yet the Liberals, because of their extreme green ideology, are opposing Canadian oil and gas development and are trying to insert carbon tax poison pills into trade deals. It makes no sense. We need a government that puts the Canadian national interest and the cause of freedom ahead of extreme green ideology.

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Mr. Adam van Koeverden (Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister of Environment and Climate Change and to the Minister of Sport and Physical Activity, Lib.)

Feb/5/24 5:34:11 p.m.
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Mr. Speaker, that is more shameless “Consplaining” from the Conservative member for Sherwood Park—Fort Saskatchewan. It is incredible to watch Conservatives twist themselves into knots to try to justify their shameful vote against Ukraine. My questions for the member are simple: Who does their vote against the Canada-Ukraine free trade agreement satisfy or make happy? Who asked the Conservative members to vote against the Canada-Ukraine free trade agreement? It was not one of their constituents. It was not the Ukrainian Canadian Congress or anybody else. Who asked them to vote against the Canada-Ukraine free trade agreement?

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Mr. Garnett Genuis

Feb/5/24 5:34:53 p.m.
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Mr. Speaker, I want to take this opportunity to congratulate Parm Gill on becoming a Conservative. I know he will ask very good questions in the House. This is a matter of looking at the details of the agreement, which the member clearly is not even familiar with. I read out details that he claimed did not exist. I think it is the responsibility of legislators to know what is in legislation they are voting on. I doubt that the member has even read the agreement. If he read it, he would know that the section I read obliges Canada to promote carbon pricing and measures to mitigate carbon leakage. Conservatives are opposed to that and are supportive of Ukraine. When it comes to supporting Ukraine, the Liberal government should be focusing on delivering weapons, not just making announcements, but actually following up and giving Ukraine the weapons it needs in order to secure victory.

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Gill

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