- Member of Parliament
- Member of Parliament
- Conservative
- Sarnia—Lambton
- Ontario
- Voting Attendance: 67%
- Expenses Last Quarter: $118,419.33
- Government Page
- May/9/24 10:49:49 p.m.
- Watch
Mr. Speaker, the member opposite talked about the Infrastructure Bank and using that for housing. I will make some allowances for the member, because I do not think he was here when the Liberals took $35 billion away from municipalities, money that was supposed to build infrastructure there, and put it into the bank. The idea was supposed to be that it was going to attract private investment and build large projects, but in five years, it built no projects. It also did not attract any private investment.
After all the Liberal insiders who were in there and after no projects were built, how should Canadians have any confidence that the Infrastructure Bank can build houses?
116 words
- Hear!
- Rabble!
- add
- star_border
- share
- May/9/24 8:27:32 p.m.
- Watch
Madam Speaker, this bill talks a lot about the middle class. However, in my riding, the middle class is poorer because of rising taxes and the rising cost of housing and food.
What is the situation like in Quebec? Is it the same there?
44 words
- Hear!
- Rabble!
- add
- star_border
- share
- May/7/24 1:34:02 p.m.
- Watch
Madam Speaker, it is always interesting to hear the struggles of the people in the north. I wonder if my colleague could expand on what the need for housing is there and how this budget misses the mark.
38 words
- Hear!
- Rabble!
- add
- star_border
- share
- Feb/26/24 4:14:00 p.m.
- Watch
Madam Speaker, as I said, I absolutely support workers and people's right to collectively bargain. What I have a problem with is that, when people do not come to the table in good faith, things go on and on and, all of a sudden, there are impacts on Canadian families, Canadian businesses and our export partners. These are things that could be eliminated. There are better ways of doing it. We need to look to other countries that do it better.
I am very interested to hear about Quebec's legislation and what exactly it has done. I know there are some facilities, such as chemical facilities, etc., that would need that kind of protection.
116 words
- Hear!
- Rabble!
- add
- star_border
- share
- Feb/8/24 1:21:18 p.m.
- Watch
Mr. Speaker, the member opposite mentioned in her speech that we need nurses and construction workers, and I agree. We are short 100,000 construction workers in Ontario alone, and many thousands of nurses. The Minister of Immigration just made an arbitrary decision to cut, by 50% in Ontario, colleges, which produce nurses, construction workers and those kinds of things.
Would the member commit to take this back to her caucus to try and get exemptions for colleges that are providing housing and adequate support, and producing the nurses and construction workers we need?
94 words
- Hear!
- Rabble!
- add
- star_border
- share
- Feb/2/24 11:10:28 a.m.
- Watch
Madam Speaker, after eight years of the Liberal-NDP government, the cost of rent has doubled and housing is simply not affordable, if someone can even find a house or apartment to rent. Canadians are being forced to choose between eating, heating and paying their rent, yet the Prime Minister does not think housing is a federal responsibility. His housing minister thinks people can live in a photo op. Meanwhile, the Liberals got fewer houses built last year than were built in 1972.
Only common-sense Conservatives have a plan to build more homes instead of more bureaucracy. We will reward municipalities that build more houses and remove the barriers that hinder construction. The choice is clear: a Prime Minister who is not worth the cost or common-sense Conservatives, who will axe the tax, build homes, fix the budget and stop the crime.
144 words
- Hear!
- Rabble!
- add
- star_border
- share
- Feb/2/24 10:25:01 a.m.
- Watch
Madam Speaker, the member opposite is wrong. Conservatives absolutely support Ukraine. We have absolutely said that if the language about carbon pricing is removed from this agreement, we would sign on and would like to add a few more things that Ukraine is asking for, like LNG, like munitions, like some of the ambulances that we have and extra equipment. Things that were seized that belonged to Russia would be an advantage to Ukraine.
There are a lot of things we would like to do, but we certainly do not want to inflict a carbon tax on it that is already doubling costs in Canada and causing unaffordability.
108 words
- Hear!
- Rabble!
- add
- star_border
- share
- Nov/29/23 5:57:08 p.m.
- Watch
Madam Speaker, I thank the member for his very good speech.
There is a slaughterhouse capacity problem here in Ontario and Quebec. The Liberals have done nothing to improve the situation. What are the most important recommendations, solutions, measures or anything else for improving this situation?
46 words
- Hear!
- Rabble!
- add
- star_border
- share
- Nov/29/23 3:29:58 p.m.
- Watch
Mr. Speaker, I rise on a point of order. I think it is important that we are consistent in the way that we apply the rules in the House. During Statements by Members, one of the members opposite accused all of the Conservatives of being complicit with the Russians, which we know is not factual since we have all been banned from Russia.
When one of our members had to withdraw a comment, he also had to apologize. I respect that you asked the member to withdraw the comment, but I did not hear the apology, and I would give the member opposite the chance to do it now.
109 words
- Hear!
- Rabble!
- add
- star_border
- share
- Nov/27/23 1:52:13 p.m.
- Watch
Mr. Speaker, on a point of order, there have been lots of discussions on how we need to treat one another civilly. We should not be referring to one another with unparliamentary names. I would suggest that that is what that was, and I would ask the member to withdraw the comment.
52 words
- Hear!
- Rabble!
- add
- star_border
- share
- Nov/23/23 1:59:28 p.m.
- Watch
Madam Speaker, my colleague talked about housing and she mentioned the accelerator fund. I wonder if she is aware that the fund has been closed since August 18 of this year, so there is no further money coming forward and no further money announced until 2025-26.
47 words
- Hear!
- Rabble!
- add
- star_border
- share
Madam Speaker, I am rising today to express my serious concerns about Bill C-50. This bill is called the sustainable jobs act, which is typical of what Liberals do. They pick a name that sounds good. Who does not like sustainable jobs? I like sustainable jobs. I think all Canadians want sustainable jobs. It sounds really good, but the problem is that in this bill there is no plan to create sustainable jobs. This is a plan to get a plan.
The bill outlines how the Liberals are going to put together a council. Based on past behaviour, I suggest that it would be highly paid Liberal insiders who will get these jobs and advise on what the plan ought to be. As to the timeline of when they are going to come up with what the plan ought to be, it be should by 2025, coincidentally just after the next election.
The Liberals do not have a plan. Nothing says there is no plan like a bill that is introduced to get a plan. That is the first thing.
The second thing is the Liberals have another role, a secretariat, that is going to do some coordination, with another highly paid Liberal insider when they get the plan. The problem is that is it; that is all. It is a plan to get a plan, with some principles that are motherhood and apple pie and that we would all agree on, such as well-paying jobs, caring about the environment and the need to respect labour, all of these good things. They are all motherhood and apple pie, but the bill does not have a specific action that is going to help.
On the other hand, it is going to hurt. The analysts of the government have said that Bill C-50 would kill 170,000 direct Canadian jobs, would displace 450,000 workers directly and indirectly working in the energy sector and would risk the livelihoods of 2.7 million Canadians across all provinces. The bill would destroy as many as 2.7 million jobs when there is not a single action in it to create any sustainable jobs at all. That is a problem.
The other thing is that it is going to cost a lot of money. Right now the energy sector provides 10% of Canada's GDP and pays over $20 billion in taxes to all levels of government every year. Last year, $48 billion in royalties and taxes were contributed by the energy sector. This bill purports to get rid of that by eliminating the sector.
We can look at other places in the world that have come up with a sustainable jobs plan and are starting to implement it, Scotland being one example. If we took the cost per person of its plan and did the equivalent thing here, it would cost $37.2 billion. The Liberals are taking away as much as $48 billion and adding a cost of another $37 billion. If we do the math, they are increasing by greater than $70 billion the loss to the Canadian economy.
I do not know why the Liberal government cannot learn the lesson when countless people can, like former Liberal John Manley, who said that when it runs these huge deficits, it is putting a foot on the inflationary gas pedal, which is causing the Bank of Canada to put its foot on the brake with higher interest rates. This raises the cost of mortgages. Canadians are suffering from coast to coast, so definitely not only is the bill not going to create jobs, but it will come with a huge cost.
It is not like this is the first time there has been an attack on oil and gas and the energy sector. This has been a continual theme from the time I got elected in 2015. Let us start with the tanker ban, Bill C-48, to keep Canadian oil from getting out there when everybody else's ships are out there full of oil. Then we had Bill C-55, which created marine protected areas so we could do no oil and gas development there. Then there was Bill C-69, the “no more pipelines” bill, which was just called unconstitutional by the Supreme Court. All of these things were intended to be a war against creating oil and gas projects.
There is evidence. When the Liberals took power, there were 18 LNG projects on the books and there were four pipelines. Zero pipelines have been built and all the LNG projects but one are cancelled. Meanwhile, back at the ranch, our friends in Germany were going to give us $59 billion to replace their Russian oil and coal with our green LNG. The Prime Minister said there was no business case, so Australia took that deal.
Then Japan came up with a similar deal and again we would not take the deal, so Saudi Arabia took it. Then came France and the Netherlands. There were all these opportunities for Canada to be a leader, supplanting higher-carbon fuels with our green LNG, the most responsibly produced product in the world with the best human rights record, but again the Liberal government refused. Instead, it is focused on its own ideology and things that it wants to do that continue to destroy the economy.
We can talk about the electric vehicle mandates. That was another great idea. Let us give away $31 billion to create 3,000 jobs. For those who can do the math, if we just gave each of those 3,000 people $10 million, they would never have to work again and there would not be any footprint. There is a total misunderstanding of how to create a growing economy.
Then there is the clean electricity standard, another hugely divisive bill that was introduced by the Minister of Environment and Climate Change, clearly not understanding that where the Liberals want to go with all the electric vehicles, electricity and the grid would require building the equivalent of 19 nuclear facilities, like the one from Bruce Power. They cannot build anything, so I do not know where they get the idea that they are going to be successful in achieving that.
At the same time, they are ignoring the fact that only 7% of the public even wants an electric vehicle because the technology is not there. No one wants to be trapped in a snowstorm at -30°C because the batteries do not work. They catch fire. In addition to that, they do not have a very long range. Instead, the government decided to pick a winner and loser with the battery plants that are being built.
Now Toyota has come out with a solid-state battery, with a 1,275-kilometre range, that works at -20°C and does not catch fire. That will make our technology obsolete, with $31 billion after the fact. Maybe the Liberal government needs a few more engineers so that it can actually make science-, fact- and data-based decisions, but that is not what is happening today.
The Liberals continue to move ahead with the carbon tax and the second carbon tax, putting punishment on the backs of Canadians and achieving nothing. Emissions have gone up under the government. At the 2005 level, we were at 732 megatonnes. We needed to get to 519 and now we are at 819. They are not achieving their targets and keep putting bills like this in place, talking about sustainability, the environment and creating jobs. They are not actually achieving that.
Sarnia—Lambton has a huge oil and gas sector, but it knows how to do a transition and is doing a transition. It is creating good-paying, sustainable jobs like the ones at Origin Materials, a net-zero plastics plant in my riding. My riding has one of the largest solar facilities in North America. There is a whole bio-innovation centre that is growing different kinds of bio-facilities that are all either carbon sinks or carbon-neutral. These are the kinds of actual solutions and actions we need. That is not what is in Bill C-50. It is a plan to get a plan with nothing else. For that reason, I will not be supporting Bill C-50.
1396 words
All Topics
- Hear!
- Rabble!
- add
- star_border
- share
Madam Speaker, the member opposite would have us believe that Bill C-50 is about creating sustainable jobs, when in actual fact it is not even a plan; it is a plan to get a plan. It is the typical Liberal tactic of saying, “Let us get a bunch of well-paid LIberal insiders to be on a council to advise the government on what the plan might be. Then let us pay another high-paid Liberal insider to be the secretariat, so that two years from now, when they figure out what the plan is, it will happen.” However, nothing says that they do not have a plan like a bill that says it is a plan to get a plan.
Would the member admit they do not have a plan for sustainable jobs?
137 words
- Hear!
- Rabble!
- add
- star_border
- share
Madam Speaker, the Conservative Party has an absolutely sound and real climate change reduction plan. We would reduce emissions, increase absorptions and get a plan to actually mitigate the impacts of climate change, floods, etc., that we are seeing.
The Conservative leader has talked about small modular nuclear reactors, which could replace diesel in the north and be used, for example, to generate electricity for greenhouses for food security. We have talked about the need to increase rail in this country and to build rail with housing close to it. We have heard about those things and about LNG. There are a lot of opportunities to reduce emissions in terms of increasing absorption. Carbon sequestration is a key technology that Canada should be leveraging. We would certainly be able to actually plant trees, not just talk about planting trees.
At the end of the day, we have to have a plan, because we cannot be calling in the military every time we have a flood or a fire. It is not resourced to do that work, and we have to have a plan, because we know we are going to continue to see impacts.
194 words
- Hear!
- Rabble!
- add
- star_border
- share
Madam Speaker, I apologize.
Sustainable Marine Energy started developing an alternative energy project in the Bay of Fundy. After 10 years of hard work, it was providing clean, green energy, which is what we all want, to Nova Scotians. For all their trail-blazing efforts, Sustainable Marine Energy was awarded a tide of red tape from the Department of Fisheries and Oceans.
The repeated delays and a bombshell permit rejection, which the Liberal government refused to justify, were the straw that broke the camel's back. After five years of insurmountable regulatory challenges, the pilot project in Digby county was cancelled.
Let us think about the common elements here. Even though the project was the kind of renewable energy that the Liberal government is saying it wants to have, the company had to jump through hoops for 10 years. Finally, the government was able to pull the permit. The federal government can pull the permit without any justification. This is just a precedent of what is to come with the other projects currently existing in the petroleum sector on the coast. I am very concerned about that.
The other thing I would say is that Bill C-49 contains language to put Bill C-69 in it. It directly references the Impact Assessment Act, which, as I said, is a process that makes project approvals longer and their consultations more complicated. At the same time, someone could start and stop the process as many times as they wanted. There is lots of uncertainty. I am very unhappy about that one.
If we look at the access to offshore infrastructure, this bill says that the cabinet, the governor in council, would regulate access to that infrastructure, including enforcing tolls and tariffs. Here we go again. It is another opportunity for the Liberal government to toll, tariff and tax something that is already in place.
Who is going to pay the extra cost of those tolls, tariffs and taxes? The consumer of the energy that has been created will ultimately pay those costs. Have we not learned anything? We have seen the carbon tax get put in place. It drives up the cost of gasoline. It drives up the cost of home heating.
People in the Atlantic provinces are already struggling. All the premiers have asked for the removal of the carbon tax, and even the Liberal MPs from that area are asking for the removal of the carbon tax because it is increasing the cost of everything. It is increasing the cost of food.
They are not just taxing the farmers and putting tariffs on the fertilizer, which is another tariff and another cost that is being passed along, but they are also taxing the transporting of the goods to the processor. There is a carbon tax on the processor. They are shipping it to the grocery store with a carbon tax on that.
At the end of the day, the consumer is paying. When I see clauses such as this saying that the government can enforce tolls and tariffs on the infrastructure, I am concerned for the ultimate consumer because these costs are significant.
If we think about the carbon tax, we know from the Parliamentary Budget Officer that the carbon tax is costing, depending on what province one lives in, from $1,500 to $2,500. Then there is the second carbon tax that was put in place, and the cost of that is another $1,800. That one is in every province, even in Quebec, although they are trying to deny that it is.
We talk about extra tariffs on top of that, and Canadians are out of money. The government is out of touch when it comes to understanding that there is no more money that people can pay. They were within $200 of not being able to pay their bills before the pandemic. Now, with the increase of all these taxes, people are borrowing money to live, and some of them have lost their houses and become homeless. People are skipping meals. They cannot afford to eat. Honestly, I am very concerned when I see this kind of language in the bill.
There is also a financial stipulation in the bill. It came with a royal recommendation, which says there is some level of federal funding that is required. An obvious question may be how much the funding is. There is no answer to that. It was not in the budget. It was not in any of the forecasts.
Where is this magic money going to come from? Are we going to run additional deficits? That is inflationary spending. We keep telling the government about this. In fact, the finance minister herself said that it would be pouring fuel on the inflationary fire to have this extra spending, but then we see things such as this, where there is extra spending. It is not even defined how much it would be. That is not going to be an acceptable alternative, as far as I can tell.
I will be clear that Conservatives support the development of renewable resources, but we support those developments without political interference. We do not want the government of the day picking winners and losers and deciding what to shut down based on its ideology. That is not where we want to be. We want to see the free market drive this. There is an opportunity to create jobs, create prosperous industry and do the right thing for the environment. That is what Conservatives want to see.
I do not think this bill is capturing that. I think there is a lot of political interference put into the mechanisms of this bill in ministerial powers, cabinet powers, and tolls and tariffs. There are lots of mechanisms for the government to interfere.
Canadians are struggling, and the government's new draft regulations on clean electricity will push up costs even higher. Reporting from CTV in August indicates, “Electricity infrastructure expenses are expected to increase significantly over the next several decades as maintenance and increased demand is estimated to cost $400 billion”. That is already before we know how much the offshore renewables are going to cost.
I ask members to remember the lesson from Ontario, which was that it drove the price of electricity up so high that we were uncompetitive and people could not pay their power bills. This is not just a lesson from Canada. Germany experienced the same thing. It went heavy on renewables, which drove the cost of everything up. It then went back onto Russian oil and coal. Of course, we refused to take $59 billion to put Germany on low-carbon LNG from Canada, so Australia took that deal. It was the same thing with Japan, which gave us the same offer. Saudi Arabia took that deal.
Gee, I wish we had $120 billion more to put in our health care system so that everyone in this country could have a doctor. That is what I think. All I can say is that those are some of the concerns I have. There are many things in the bill that I do not object to. There are some administrative things that are taken care of. Those are fine.
Do I think we can fix all of this at committee? Call me skeptical, but my experience under this NDP-Liberal coalition is that its members will ram through an agenda to shut down oil and gas, and it does not matter what reasoned amendments the Conservative Party will bring at committee, as they will be refused. They will ramrod it through. They will time allocate it to make sure this thing is rushed through. They will be skimpy on the details and say, “Trust us. We'll get it in the regulations.” I have been here long enough to know that that is not good for Canadians.
Our job here as the official opposition is to point out what is wrong with these bills. It would be so nice if we could be consulted before the thing was written, when it could still be altered, but here we are with something that honestly has way too much political power in it. I do not think it is going to be good for the Atlantic provinces. They do not think it is going to be good for them. They are already crying out against the policies of the government with respect to the carbon tax.
Those are my initial thoughts. I may have more thoughts as we go forward, but I would be happy to take questions.
1441 words
All Topics
- Hear!
- Rabble!
- add
- star_border
- share
Mr. Speaker, is the member aware that the bill would give federal cabinet the power to cancel a petroleum drilling project on a whim at any point, overreaching provincial jurisdiction and disrespecting indigenous interests?
34 words
- Hear!
- Rabble!
- add
- star_border
- share
- Jun/13/23 1:40:34 p.m.
- Watch
Madam Speaker, I want to follow up on the comment about the Five Eyes.
It seems to me that we are losing our position in the world. The Five Eyes are not inviting us to meetings, NATO is losing confidence and we have not been included in the new relationship between the U.K., the U.S. and Australia.
Would the member comment on that?
65 words
- Hear!
- Rabble!
- add
- star_border
- share
Mr. Speaker, it is interesting that we are talking miscarriages of justice, because the fact that the Attorney General of Canada has not appointed enough judges, and violent rapists and murderers are going to go free because their time has been exceeded, is a miscarriage of justice. Would the minister agree?
51 words
- Hear!
- Rabble!
- add
- star_border
- share
- May/3/23 3:21:52 p.m.
- Watch
Mr. Speaker, yesterday, in question period, the Minister of Housing claimed that I had praised the housing accelerator program, so I reviewed the 479 interventions I have made on Hansard here and in committee, and I have been consistent in claiming that the government has been inadequate in their approach to affordable housing. I just wanted to correct the record.
60 words
- Hear!
- Rabble!
- add
- star_border
- share
- May/1/23 2:53:28 p.m.
- Watch
Mr. Speaker, who sowed fear and division? The Prime Minister? Who has been standing, but taking no action? The Prime Minister.
I am extremely concerned that Beijing is not at all concerned about repercussions for foreign interference in our democracy. Between the intimidation of MPs and Chinese Canadians by the Communist regime and now knowing money was directed by Beijing to the Trudeau Foundation to influence the Prime Minister, then the appointment of a past director of the Trudeau Foundation as special rapporteur to investigate interference, this whole situation stinks.
How does the Prime Minister expect us to believe anything he says about the Trudeau Foundation or about preventing foreign inference in our democracy?
114 words
- Hear!
- Rabble!
- add
- star_border
- share
- menumenu
- notificationsnotifications
- home
- mailmail
- searchsearch
