Hon. Leo Housakos (Acting Leader of the Opposition): Honourable senators, last week, Hong Kong Watch, a U.K.-based organization dedicated to monitoring and exposing threats against Hong Kong’s basic freedoms and autonomy, was itself threatened under the draconian national security law imposed on Hong Kong by the Chinese communist regime. In addition to using this law to block Hong Kong Watch’s website in Hong Kong, Beijing is threatening the organization, of which I am a patron, with a fine and the imprisonment of its Chief Executive, Benedict Rogers, for telling the world the truth about what is happening in Hong Kong.

This organization is not based in Hong Kong, yet the Chinese regime feels very comfortable threatening them and threatening Mr. Rogers, a British citizen, just as the Chinese Ambassador to Canada felt very comfortable threatening Canadian parliamentarians in late 2019 because of a motion I brought forward, along with Senator Ngo.

As Lord Patten of Barnes, the last British Governor of Hong Kong and a patron of Hong Kong Watch commented:

This is another disgraceful example of Mr Putin’s friends in Beijing and their quislings in Hong Kong trying not only to stamp out freedom of expression and information in Hong Kong but also to internationalise their campaign against evidence, freedom and honesty.

Lord Alton of Liverpool, a patron of Hong Kong Watch and one of the parliamentarians sanctioned by China, said last year:

This represents a significant escalation in the Chinese Communist Party regime’s attempts to silence dissent well beyond its borders . . . .

Hong Kong Watch’s Chief Executive, Benedict Rogers, himself said:

By threatening a UK-based NGO with financial penalties and jail for merely reporting on the human rights situation in Hong Kong, this letter exemplifies why Hong Kong’s National Security Law is so dangerous.

We will not be silenced by an authoritarian security apparatus which, through a mixture of senseless brutality and ineptitude, has triggered rapid mass migration out of the city and shut down civil society.

I echo all of these statements, and I remind everyone of the growing threat from the communist regime of China right here in Canada. Hong Kong Watch has trustees, patrons, staff and volunteers here in Canada, so these threats should very much be a matter of interest to this chamber and to the Canadian government.

I call on this chamber and the Government of Canada to join me in expressing support for Mr. Rogers and everyone involved in Hong Kong Watch and to make it clear that the draconian national security law will not be used to threaten or intimidate Canadians or anyone else on Canadian soil, nor anyone else involved with Hong Kong Watch anywhere in the world.

Thank you, colleagues.

Hon. Leo Housakos (Acting Leader of the Opposition): Honourable senators, my question is for the government leader in the Senate. Government leader, this morning we saw the Prime Minister of Canada go before the people of Canada to try to defend the indefensible. Late last night, we saw that there was a deal negotiated by Prime Minister Trudeau and the NDP in order to essentially create a majority government, which is, without a doubt, an unprecedented power grab.

We know full well that in the last election the NDP received 17% of the vote. We also clearly know that this is not the agenda that the people of Canada have embraced. How can the Prime Minister justify this?

Over the next three and a half years, the NDP has agreed to unequivocally support four budgets, and we already have a government in place that has been spending money like a drunken sailor. Now we have a clear indication that they will continue down that path and more.

Today, while the Prime Minister stood before the Canadian public trying to justify this majority coalition government — which the people of Canada clearly did not choose only six months ago in a general election — there was not a single figure attached to how much this deal between the NDP, the Liberals and Prime Minister Trudeau will cost taxpayers. Can you explain to us what the exact number is — the cost to taxpayers — for this power grab coalition between the NDP and the Liberals?

Senator Housakos: The only one to benefit from this is the Liberal government that got a minority mandate and are trying, through negotiation and deals with the socialist NDP, to turn it into a majority government. The only one to benefit here, let’s be clear, is the Liberal government.

I have previously raised the affordability crisis impacting Canadian families in this place. Inflation, as you know, government leader, is at a three-year high, and it will remain sky‑high under an NDP-Liberal coalition government. The NDP‑Liberal coalition government will be a high-spending, high-tax government with no regard whatsoever for the deficit or the cost of living.

Government leader, let’s be clear, we have a 30-year high in inflation. We have challenges for single mothers and middle‑class families to be able to feed their children due to just inflation. We see these difficulties every time a Canadian goes to the pump in order to fill their car or truck to go to work. We see the cost for young Canadians when they go out there to try to become first-time home buyers and the difficulty they are having in this country.

This NDP-Liberal coalition will further impact the daily lives of these Canadians because the NDP has given you a blank cheque until 2025, yet, the government leader in the Senate can’t tell us the exact figure of costs and how much this coalition is going to cost Canadian taxpayers.