- Member of Parliament
- Member of Parliament
- Bloc Québécois
- Trois-Rivières
- Quebec
- Voting Attendance: 63%
- Expenses Last Quarter: $100,349.98
- Government Page
- Feb/27/24 4:39:57 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, we have been talking about procurement and ArriveCAN. There were plenty of disasters before ArriveCAN. When we look at the government's real capacity to manage passports, borders, when we look at WE Charity or employment insurance, Canada Life, we realize one thing: the government is incapable of carrying out its fundamental duty, which is to provide services to the public.
I have seen my colleague and his colleagues show some contrition many times. They say they are sorry, that this will never happen again, that the investigations are under way. In reality, these incidents occur on a regular basis.
Earlier my colleague talked about ethics. I would like to know what she thinks, ethically speaking, about these endless scandals.
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- Jun/19/23 2:48:48 p.m.
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Mr. Speaker, the government's response may be worse than the situation itself.
It says that it has given instructions to inform ministers from now on about hot issues that concern them, such as the transfer of prisoners of interest or threats against elected members. This government has been in power since 2015 and it is telling us it is now requiring its ministers to be made aware of their portfolios. That raises an ethical question.
Which is worse: Ministers who do not know anything about anything or ministers who wait until the eighth year of government to require being informed of their portfolios?
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- Mar/21/23 11:42:15 a.m.
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Madam Speaker, I thank my colleague for his speech. It was extremely important.
It is sad that we have come to a point where we need to legislate something as important as this.
What sorts of controls would my colleague recommend for companies that do not already have basic ethical standards in place to self-regulate in such cases?
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- Mar/20/23 2:45:24 p.m.
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Mr. Speaker, if they want to know what independence looks like, they should be asking us.
It would be easy to criticize Mr. Johnston's appointment as special rapporteur, but that would be letting the government off easy over its most significant ethical failure. CSIS is saying this is the greatest threat to national security, yet the government is choosing to cover it up. Seemingly unaware that foreign interference is spreading, it is choosing to buy time.
To put it bluntly, there are only two possible conclusions to the special rapporteur's review. The first is to sweep the whole business under the rug, and the second is to propose an independent public inquiry, which is what everyone is asking for.
Why not cut to the chase, be ethical for once and launch the inevitable inquiry?
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- Nov/1/22 10:58:36 a.m.
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Madam Speaker, I was saying that the worst obligation for a prince is always having to cover things up.
Unlike the Conservatives, who were not pleased to speak to our motion last week, I am pleased to speak to the Conservative motion this morning. I am pleased to talk about it.
A lot of attention has been given to inflation. However, I will look at this from another angle, specifically, from an ethical perspective. Ethics is about doing the right thing. Currently I am concerned. I am concerned because the articles we read in the media leave us with a lot of questions. They leave us hanging. They pique our interest and then fail to report on what really happened with ArriveCAN. I am concerned and this is why.
For several years now, the government has made a habit of outsourcing its services. Many services have been outsourced to the private sector. Here we are talking about GC Strategies. Again and again, private firms are benefiting from the government's decision to let go of the expertise it should have internally. By outsourcing its services, the government is draining departments of their expertise, thereby becoming vulnerable to the whims of its outsourcers. I recently read a book about the McKinsey firm entitled When McKinsey Comes to Town. Companies like McKinsey advise governments and, on some level, influence public policy despite the fact that they are not elected. I am therefore concerned. I am concerned that the government is outsourcing this procedure and the related expertise.
GC Strategies knows all this. The company is a two-person intermediary that finds resources elsewhere. Without this intermediary, however, the government of Canada could not act. I am a little concerned about that as well. I wonder what that company had that the departments in question did not. Outsourcing worries me. I am concerned that companies are influencing public policy and making choices that governments should be making.
On several occasions, the government has shown a culture of secrecy and cover-ups. Secrecy means preventing others from seeing and knowing, and to cover up is to make believe. The government's culture is often to make us believe something other than the truth. We are kept in the dark. Essentially, there are some files, of which ArriveCAN is a prime example, that show us how secretive the government's intentions are. It does not want us to understand. I am concerned about this culture of cover-ups.
As they say, people who know they are serious tend to be clear, while those who want to look serious tend to be secretive. I think this applies here.
Basically, when I look at ArriveCAN from an ethics standpoint, what strikes me is the fact that they talk about trust. Trust is the foundation of life in society. Without trust, we are constantly asking questions, which, incidentally, is what we are doing now. Trust means not having to provide proof. When there is no trust, we need a facsimile or substitute: transparency.
When trust is not possible, we must content ourselves with transparency. However, trust is more important. Transparency enables us to see behind a policy, but trust enables us to live together. Montaigne talked about loving without hate and hating without love. That is what trust is, the ability to work hand in hand without always having to provide proof.
The thing I dislike about ArriveCAN is the constant need for proof, the constant need for one party or another to introduce a motion or go to committee to demand an explanation about what was done because we do not understand. It is never particularly clear.
When trust is not possible, we must content ourselves with transparency. When the government engages in dissimulation, it prevents us from seeing its intent. It is on the verge of lying. I am not saying that it is lying. What is lying? It is making someone do something they would not have done had they known the truth.
I travelled to Rwanda this summer, and I had a hard time entering my information in ArriveCAN. When I returned to Canada, no one even asked to see it. That is how useful it is. I was a little taken aback.
Once again, lying is what hinders communication between two entities. The government is not quite lying, but almost. That is when we need to act ethically. When we are lost in a fog of uncertainty, a grey area, we need to act ethically, which means that, in a discussion such as this one, I am going to focus a little less on myself and a little more on others. I will think about others. In a situation like this, I know that I am going to have to be open-minded to understand what is at issue.
Above all, acting ethically means doing the right thing even when no one is watching. I have a story about this from classical philosophy. There was once an emir who had a ring adorned with a small diamond. By twisting the ring on his finger, he could become invisible. Well, he lost the ring, of course. It was found by one of his slaves, who put it on, twisted it around and went off to the harem. The rest can be imagined, but in all the excitement, the ring twisted back around and he became visible again. Let us say he had a rough day after that.
This is what I mean: Acting ethically means doing the right thing even when no one is watching. We, the opposition members, including the Conservatives who moved this motion, are watching. All we see is secrecy. We are not okay with that.
I would like someone to explain why the government used such a strategy, specifically an outside business that subcontracted its services. I do not know much about IT services, but I do not see how something would start at $80,000 or $250,000 and end up costing $54 million, even though I understand that there are many things included in the cost breakdown. It seems to me that an organization as large as the Government of Canada should be able to do such work itself without resorting to this type of middleman.
I am curious and I would really like some help understanding this situation, shedding some light on it and getting rid of the secrecy. That is what I want, but I am not sure we will be able to do it.
I will quickly conclude by saying that, beyond the fact that the ArriveCAN app appears unnecessary, as I did not use it when returning to Canada, I find it outrageous that money is being spent frivolously and that we often accept it and just let it go.
Paul Valéry, an author that I really like, said that it is not the wicked who do the most harm in this world. It is the maladroit, the negligent and the credulous. The wicked would be powerless without a certain quota of the good.
It is time for the good people to stand up and say that enough is enough. I would like to get to the bottom of this.
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- Oct/3/22 2:28:15 p.m.
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Mr. Speaker, the decision to make Roxham Road and all its facilities permanent raises some serious ethical questions.
We know that the government awarded two Liberal donors at least seven contracts without a bidding process. We have no idea if there are more.
Since the government refuses to disclose all the contracts, this afternoon, I will be asking the Standing Committee on Ethics to investigate the ethical aspect of awarding contracts.
If the government has nothing to hide, it should disclose these documents itself. Will it make public all the federal contracts tied to Roxham Road?
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- Feb/19/22 12:13:59 p.m.
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Absolutely, Madam Speaker. I fully agree.
The context that I am bringing here allows me to draw a line, which for the moment is drawn as a solid line but where we can see the dots that are connected. I will shorten my remarks on the line in question.
A little later, the Prime Minister was still making headlines about ethics and the SNC-Lavalin affair. When we read the report, we learned that the commissioner had tried to meet with him a hundred times, but that did not happen. In my opinion, this is avoidance. There too, he was not responsible for anything.
That has continued; this line is continuous and that is what we need to see. In 2020, as we know, the federal cabinet chose WE Charity to administer the Canada student service grant. There were ties between that organization and the Prime Minister's family, namely his children, his wife, his brother, and so on. The Prime Minister did not shoulder the blame in that situation, but we know what happened next. I mention all of this to say that the Prime Minister has a troubled relationship with ethics, with the concepts of what is right and just, which brings us to the Emergencies Act.
In my opinion, in these situations that I briefly described, the Prime Minister demonstrated a complete lack of judgment, and that is not what we expect from a leader. Even recently, on the National Day for Truth and Reconciliation, the Prime Minister chose to go surfing rather than to pay tribute to a people he personally chose to honour. Is that an ethical failure? Certainly not, but it shows a lack of judgment. Once again that is not what we expect from a leader. The most recent example of a lack of judgment is the invocation of the Emergencies Act.
I am listing these failures in order to draw attention to the Liberal mindset. In my opinion, repeated errors in judgment and contempt are part of their DNA. When we have contempt for an object or person, we believe they are unworthy of respect or esteem. I will give three examples of contempt relating to the office of Prime Minister, the institution of Parliament and the people.
At the beginning of his mandate, the Prime Minister showed contempt for his office with the costumes he wore. He should understand that he is not acting in a play.
As for contempt for the institution of Parliament, the ethics breaches that I mentioned and the audacity of calling an unnecessary vanity election come to mind.
As for contempt for the public, after actively doing nothing, the Prime Minister uselessly invoked the Emergencies Act, which is not something that the provinces wanted or found to be useful under the circumstances—as my colleagues have clearly shown—because most of the powers used so far by police officers already existed at the provincial and municipal levels.
It is a strong-handed measure that is actually an admission of weakness. In fact, it is a textbook case of hubris—my friends know my background in philosophy. Hubris is when somebody becomes too vain, cocky or intoxicated with power, and eventually loses control and risks making poor and potentially fatal decisions.
The Prime Minister has made an art out of adding insult to injury through his lack of substance, numerous ethics breaches, poor judgment, contempt, arrogance and hubris.
The Prime Minister called an unnecessary snap election and invoked the Emergencies Act for no good reason, which did not help in Coutts, in Windsor, or even in Ottawa. That, to me, is unacceptable. How did we end up here? If we have been paying any attention at all, and add up the lack of judgment and leadership, it is hardly surprising that we are here today discussing this legislation.
When I look at everything that the Prime Minister has done, it seems to me that over time he has started to confuse public interest with political games, public interest with personal interest.
The Emergencies Act is the wrong response, a response lacking in leadership to a situation that required maximum leadership. The Emergencies Act, as I said, is a strong move, but it is an admission of weakness. Rather than bringing out the nuclear weapons, I think that he should have acted sooner. I wonder whether the Prime Minister should put the legislation in question to a free vote in order to see what all members of the House really think.
Before he racks up one too many lapses in judgment, I encourage the Prime Minister to ask himself whether he still feels like governing.
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