- Member of Parliament
- Member of Parliament
- Conservative
- Saskatoon West
- Saskatchewan
- Voting Attendance: 65%
- Expenses Last Quarter: $140,909.92
- Government Page
- Nov/2/23 3:51:40 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, his NDP brothers and sisters in Saskatchewan voted unanimously to support this measure in the House when we vote on it on Monday.
I am curious to know if the NDP in Ottawa will actually listen and take the advice of their very good brothers and sisters in Saskatchewan. They are very close, yet I am not convinced that they are going to listen to them.
This is something that NDP members in British Columbia, Alberta, Saskatchewan and Manitoba are all saying needs to change. I just want to put a bug in his ear and that of the whole NDP here.
Will they support this motion, as their brothers and sisters have in Saskatchewan?
An hon. member: B.C. has its own carbon tax. You know that. Say it out loud.
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- Apr/27/23 1:43:51 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, there are many things that come to mind. The very first thing that is top of mind and top of mind for many people in Saskatchewan is the carbon tax. The member spoke about providing for the country and of course he is referring to food and the way that hard-working farmers in Saskatchewan and other prairie provinces produce food not only for Canada but for the world. What we are seeing here is a tremendous amount of money that is being spent by each farmer to cover the cost of the carbon tax. That cost is only going up from this point. It is going to triple from where it is now. A typical farmer pays more than $150,000 a year in carbon tax.
What happens to that carbon tax? It ends up getting built in to the cost of the products that the farmers produce, which then shows up at the grocery store. When people go to the grocery store and wonder why prices are so high and why they are seeing 10% and 6% inflation on grocery prices in the grocery store, part of the answer to that is the carbon tax. The carbon tax is built into the cost of everything that is in the grocery store. That is a huge element of what we are seeing. People in Saskatchewan would like to see this carbon tax reduced because they are not getting the benefit. They are paying more than they are receiving back.
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Mr. Speaker, first, I would like to wish everyone in this chamber and all of the people of Saskatoon a merry Christmas and a very happy new year.
This is the time of the year that many of us get to spend with family, friends and other loved ones. For some of us, it is truly a joyous season full of wonderment. For others, the holiday season reminds us of people lost and of relations lost. It is a hard time for those individuals.
As we all reflect on the past year and look forward to the next year, I want to offer these words of hope to all of the good folks throughout Saskatoon. May 2023 bring new beginnings, peace, good health and prosperity to members and their families.
As the member of Parliament representing the west side of Saskatoon, I will continue to work hard to raise up our city, our neighbourhoods and each of us to the best that we can be in 2023.
As we get into these last days of 2022, Bill C-18 has landed back in the House of Commons for its final round of debate before being shipped off to the other place. This legislation is one of three Internet censorship laws that the NDP-Liberal government has brought in since the last election.
Its goal is to ensure that voices other than its own, and news stories it does not like, are silenced in our democracy. I had the chance to speak to Bill C-11, which would have given almost dictator-like powers to a branch of the federal government to decide what people post on Facebook, Twitter, TikTok and other Internet platforms.
If the content is not in line with the NDP-Liberal messaging of the day, algorithms would be manipulated to remove that content from one's feeds and searches. Members do not have to take my word for it. The head of that very government agency admitted as much to the Senate committee when it took up that legislation. What is worse, the NDP-Liberals just shrug their shoulders because that was the very point of the legislation.
This legislation, Bill C-18, is the second Internet censorship law that the NDP-Liberals are forcing down the throats of Canadians. Simply put, this law would force Facebook, Google and other Internet companies to prioritize CBC and other government-approved news outlets on our feed over the smaller alternative news media platforms that may be more critical of the NDP-Liberal view of the world.
The third piece of legislation currently before this Parliament is Bill C-27, which I hope to address in the new year. That legislation is the so-called digital privacy legislation, which is a laughable topic from an NDP-Liberal government that tracked millions of Canadian’s cell phones during the pandemic without their consent and has been responsible for the personal data of hundreds of thousands of Canadians ending up on the dark web.
The truth is that the Internet and social media are an integrated part of our lives today. Until now, they have been an unfettered part of our lives. Canadians use social media platforms to access and share a variety of different news articles and information among colleagues, family and friends. Canadians I talk to are very worried that these three laws will limit their ability to have open conversations online.
For legislation that is supposedly about promoting online news, the NDP-Liberals and their allies in the CBC and traditional media have been spreading a lot of misinformation about it. The current government wants to have Bill C-18 so it can use algorithms to keep information it does not like away from our feeds and Internet searches.
Bill C-18 essentially grants the government the ability to force online platforms, such as Facebook and Google, to sign deals under the duress of government penalty to promote government-approved content. These commercial agreements do not just have to be acceptable to the platform and the news organization but to the government as well.
The government agency in charge of implementing Bill C-18’s censorship provisions is called the CRTC, and it would oversee every step of this process to ensure they are satisfactory to the NDP-Liberals. Surprise, surprise, all nine members of the CRTC are appointed by the Liberal Minister of Heritage.
I am not the only one seeing past the government’s spin on this. Outside experts such as Michael Geist, who is the research chair in Internet and e-commerce law at the University of Ottawa, said this at the heritage committee in relation to Bill C-18, “Bill C-18’s dangerous approach…regulates which platforms must pay in order to permit expression from their users and dictates which sources are entitled to compensation.”
The former vice-chair of the CRTC, Peter Menzies, told the committee how the government can influence news companies:
You could end up with companies wishing to please the CRTC or the CRTC feeling pressure to make sure money in newsrooms is spent on certain topics, and they might be good topics, but it's frankly none of their business to have.... An independent press spends its money on whatever it wants.
Who are we to believe, the independent experts or the CBC, which is already in the pockets of the NDP-Liberal government?
A question that comes to mind is who benefits the most from this Internet censorship? It certainly is not the average everyday user of the Internet who is logging into their feed to keep up with the news. It is definitely not the independent journalists trying to make a living and provide accurate news. It could be no other than the legacy media, more specifically the folks at the CBC.
The CBC and other legacy news organizations have been complaining for years about their inability to keep up with the modern online news media. Then they proceeded to lobby the government for $600 million in bailouts. CBC, for example, rakes in $1.2 billion in federal funding and receives $250 million in combined TV and online advertising revenue, yet it still struggles to survive in the Canadian market, as it cannot keep up with the modern tech era.
This is where Bill C-18 comes to play. The government is looking to tip the scales further in CBC's favour. The government has decided that it is a bad look to continue giving more billion-dollar bailouts to the CBC, so now the government is forcing tech companies like Facebook and Google to make NDP-Liberal approved commercial deals to fund the legacy media.
Instead, the legacy media should be competing on the open market, as many independent journalists are doing as we speak. At the end of the day, online platforms and Canadian taxpayers should not be footing the bill if the legacy media is unable to keep up with the times.
Let us talk about how this legislation would affect the news Canadians access.
Bill C-18 would prohibit digital intermediary operators from giving what the CRTC determines as “preference” in news ranking. That sounds relatively fine, does it not? No, it is not. With this unclear language added into the bill, just about anyone could call up the CRTC to contest their ranking and be brought up to the top of any search engine or platform.
I think this gets to the heart of the matter. Trying to regulate content on the Internet will always introduce bias into the conversation. At best, it is an innocent hassle. At worst, it can be used by the government to suppress real information and control people. In my view, the risk of the worst case is not worth it. As they say, the juice is not worth the squeeze.
Let us talk about Google, Facebook, TikTok, Twitter and the Internet in general.
First let me say that Elon Musk's recent purchase of Twitter has shaken up Silicon Valley and the status quo in big tech quite a bit and has perhaps breathed some fresh air into what was becoming a stale industry. His commitment to free speech and his willingness to stand up to the powers that be show how big tech can directly influence elections or stay neutral, as they should.
Of course, in Canada, this legislation has the potential to tip the scales toward the NDP-Liberals during elections. Big tech recognizes that and they do not want to be tools of censorship in Canada or anywhere else.
Last spring, I met the executives of Google and it was an eye-opening experience. They are concerned. They worry that Bill C-18 does not have the tools to provide relief to smaller news outlets. After all, it was not the small independent news outlets that wanted this in the first place. It was the large media networks that lobbied for this to get done and that are now foaming at the mouth to get this legislation rammed through Parliament.
Members should not kid themselves. Google is not just afraid for its bottom line. It is a multi-billion dollar business and will absorb the costs associated with this legislation. Its real fear is about freedom of speech on the Internet. They may run worldwide organizations, but the Silicon Valley boys are still hackers at heart, living out of their mothers' basements playing Halo, sharing on Twitch and posting on Reddit. Google is concerned that the government is making it more difficult for Canadians to access quality information.
I also met with Amazon World Services in the summer, and we talked about a variety of issues related to this legislation. I can tell members that Google and Amazon do not just meet random opposition members from Saskatoon unless they have real concerns about where this country is going. It is Canadians who are the best judge of what content they want to consume, not some government bureaucrats.
We have seen Canadian content creators thrive in an open and competitive market, one being Hitesh Sharma, a Punjabi hip-hop artist from Saskatchewan who built up a large following on TikTok and later made it to the Junos. He did not need the CRTC to give him a path to fame.
It is very important that we allow our creators, whether they are influencers or media, to flourish against the top creators in the world. That is not to say we should not support our local media when we can, but we should recognize the talent we already have, all of whom have succeeded without the involvement of big government interference.
With Bill C-18, local Canadian content creators could be squeezed out of our newsfeeds and replaced with the CBC. I guess that is fine for the few people who tune into CBC on a regular basis, but for most people, especially younger people, the desire is for a free and open Internet where we can search for whatever we want, free of interference by government or anyone else. That is what Canadians want.
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Madam Speaker, as always, it is an honour to rise and speak in ths House on behalf of the constituents of Saskatoon West. I thought it would be fair to let members know, right up front, that I am planning to vote against this legislation. I know they are always curious about why we vote the way we do, so I would like them know why I am going to be voting that way.
First, I want to set the stage regarding the rental benefit that is in this legislation. We are in an era of the highest inflation that we have had in 40 years. We have food prices that are at double-digit inflation right now. Our housing costs are among the highest in the world. It is very difficult for people to afford to live right now.
Our energy costs are high. They are higher than they need to be because of all the taxes, including the carbon tax that was put on by the current Liberal government. Home heating is more expensive than ever. In fact, this winter many people in Canada will be paying double or more on their home heating bills than they have paid before. It is partly due to the tripling of the carbon tax that is happening.
These are difficult and challenging times for people with low incomes, seniors and also for those who have fixed incomes. It is very difficult for them to find a way to stretch that money to make it work with the increased expenses that we have.
There is an old proverb that says this: Give a man a fish and feed him for a day; teach a man to fish and feed him for a lifetime. I suggest that this plan is in the first category and this is why.
What we need are long-term solutions. We need a way to fix things. This is a short-term band-aid. It is a one-time payment.
The average rent in Canada right now is about $2,000 a month. Take that payment of $500 on a monthly basis and it is a quarter of a month or one week. Realistically, thinking of it over a year, it is $42 a month for a year. The truth is that there probably is not going to be an additional payment of this type during the tenure of the government. If the tenure of the government happens to be four years, which I certainly hope it is not, that would be $10 a month over four years. Ten dollars a month on a $2,000 rent bill makes no difference at all.
Nobody is going to refuse that $500, and I am certain that people need that money. The problem is that it is going to alleviate the problem for today. What about tomorrow, when the next bill comes due? How are they going to do that? This is not a long-term solution.
What is a long-term solution? We could be encouraging more housing and not simply throwing money after housing. I was a home builder for 12 years, so I am well aware of the challenges faced by home builders and housing providers in this country. One of the things that always frustrated me was how our municipalities would slow down the process and gum up the works. When people wanted to get a building permit, for example, it would take months to get one when it should not happen that way. Builders who are experienced and accredited should be able to get building permits quickly.
Members may have heard the term “gatekeepers” used around this place. That is a great example of a gatekeeper. They are some of the municipal systems that are in place to restrict and prevent things from happening in a quick way. That is something that we need to encourage them to fix.
Another thing is reducing red tape in bureaucracy in general. I am thinking of the building codes. We keep having more complicated building codes piled on top of building codes. Every time a new requirement is added to the building code it adds costs to the product they are building, which in this case is a house, and to the time to build it. Building codes are another thing that really reduce and end up restricting the amount of housing supply.
Ultimately, we need lower interest rates because everybody has to pay and it affects the cost to everybody. How can we lower our interest rates? What we need to do to lower our interest rates is build up our economy. Some people may not realize it, but over the last three years, most of the jobs that have been created in this country have been government jobs. They have not been private sector jobs. They have been government jobs that are ultimately paid for, through our taxes, by all of us who are working.
What we really need to do is focus on the natural resources that we have in our country. When we develop, sell and export our natural resources, that produces not only wealth for our country, but also tax revenues for the various levels of government, including the federal government. We have oil and natural gas. They are the third-largest reserves in the world. Canada has the best standards, when it comes to environment and labour, and we pay very well in this country. Compared to almost every other country, we are far ahead in being a better producer and a more environmentally friendly producer of oil and gas. We need to do that.
We need pipelines so that we can get our products to the east and to the west. Right now, we cannot help Europe very much with natural gas, which is a huge need because of the war in Ukraine. It is a shame that we cannot help Europe when we have exactly what it needs.
We have rare earth elements, and in my riding we have potash. We have potash all over the place in Saskatchewan and have a company called Nutrien. It has thousands of employees in Saskatoon, and we lead the world in potash production. The government is trying to push through a reduction in potash use in our agriculture sector, which is simply going to reduce the amount of output and the amount of food that is grown, ultimately raising the price of food.
We cannot do that. We need to encourage non-government jobs and private sector jobs that create wealth for our country and raise tax revenue. Ultimately, this will stop inflation, and if we stop inflation we can stop our deficits and our borrowing and can start to enjoy the benefits of a strong economy. To do that, we especially need a “pay as you go” law so that when new spending is introduced, we find a way to save it somewhere else. The result of that would be low inflation and lower taxes. That would be teaching a man to fish.
I want to talk a bit about the dental benefit. There is a dental health crisis in Canada. Actually, no, there is not. Now that I think about it, it is a mental health crisis. That is what is happening in Canada. I have not heard of a dental health crisis in this country.
What about the mental health crisis? One in five Canadians experiences mental illness. Every day in Canada, an average of 10 people die by suicide. Mental health challenges affect every Canadian in different ways. Some of us struggle with diagnosed conditions such as post-traumatic stress disorder, depression and anxiety. Others struggle in silence with shame, eating disorders, addictions or alcoholism.
Causes are hard to pinpoint. It can be trauma or tragedy of the worst kind in childhood or adulthood. It can be a physiological chemical imbalance. The DNA and genes we inherit from our parents play a role. Learned behaviour growing up at home, in school and in the workplace can also contribute. Add in race, religion, gender, sexual orientation, income bracket and other factors, and treatment, unfortunately, is haphazard. Some mental health disorders are diagnosed by the police and treated by the courts with prison sentences. Other people are fortunate enough to find themselves a physician, psychiatrist or other professional who can help them.
What we do not have in this country is an actual strategy to tackle mental health, particularly the causes, symptoms and treatments, on a national scale. Over two years ago, my Conservative colleague from Cariboo—Prince George proposed a national suicide hotline. Surely we would think this is a no-brainer the Liberal government could support for Canadians. However, if I dialed 988 right now, it would tell me to hang up and call a different number in English only.
What should we do when a francophone experiences a mental health crisis?
We therefore continue to wait. In the last election, the Liberals promised $4.5 billion for mental health, and we continue to wait. Instead, we have $700 million for the dental health crisis.
Why are we looking at this legislation today? We have a problem to be solved. All legislation is like this: There is a problem to be solved and legislation is supposedly going to fix that problem. What are the problems we have today? We have the cost of living. The rental benefit would not fix that; it is a short-term band-aid. We have a mental health crisis, and this dental benefit certainly would not fix that. Why do we have this legislation? Was there research, focus groups or surveys? I doubt there are many people who want a short-term band-aid on our economy. I also doubt there are many people who want to spend more money and put us into more debt.
I suggest this bill is simply the equivalent of a sideshow, a carny trick or a shiny object in the window meant to distract Canadians. It is meant to have Canadians believe that action is being taken to address poverty and affordability issues while nothing is really being done. Bill C-31 is like those fixed games at the carnival. It is flashy and exciting looking, but as we keep playing the NDP-Liberal game and keep losing our hard-earned money with little return, we realize it is a sucker's game. They are taking money away from us in the way of higher taxes. They continue to have Canadians pay more hoping to get that oversized stuffed animal. Then they give us a free play and another free play, except in this one they say we do not have to pay for it. However, it is our grandchildren who are going to be paying for it in the future when our national debt comes due. In the meantime, they give us some scraps. The government is running that kind of game.
There is a better way to run our country. For years, the Conservatives have warned that there are consequences from the Liberal-NDP's actions. The Conservatives call on the government to scour government spending, find savings for proposals like the $35-billion Canada Infrastructure Bank and stop useless spending like the $54-million ArriveCAN app. Finally, the Conservatives call on the Liberals to cancel all planned tax increases, including the payroll tax hikes on January 1 and the tripling of the carbon tax on gas—
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- May/13/22 11:11:28 a.m.
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Mr. Speaker, today is Friday the 13th, a very scary day for Saskatchewan agriculture.
Here in this House the environment minister and the agriculture minister are creating their own horror movie. Like Freddy and Jason before them, they are slashers. This time they want to slash two key industries in Saskatchewan, farming and fertilizer production.
In Saskatoon West, Nutrien, the largest fertilizer producer on the planet, employs over 3,000 people. If the government slashers have their way, Nutrien will be forced to sell its potash to someone else, and our farmers will pay the price.
We have seen this NDP-Liberal pattern before, attacking Canadian industries in the name of climate change and allowing other countries to take jobs and economic growth away from Canadians. In this case, we are seeing the NDP-Liberals diminish the capacity of wheat fields in Saskatchewan while getting the Americans to pick up the slack.
However, we should not fear; every nightmare ends eventually. Once Canadians give this government the boot, Conservatives will be ready to get to work and promote our resources around the globe.
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- Mar/29/22 2:52:30 p.m.
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Mr. Speaker, when lifting COVID mandates in my home province of Saskatchewan, Premier Moe said the following: “It's time to heal the divisions.” Premier Moe recognizes something the Prime Minister simply cannot, that a leader must unite Canadians. Instead the Prime Minister is using every opportunity to divide Canadians based on vaccination status. Dr. Tam has stated that the science supports a review of federal COVID mandates and restrictions.
Since the government claims to listen to science, why is it not immediately announcing a plan to lift all federal COVID mandates and restrictions?
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- Mar/1/22 2:59:20 p.m.
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Mr. Speaker, I asked the Liberals about inflation in Saskatchewan, and the government confirmed the negative impact of inflation on the poverty line throughout my province. In fact, the poverty rate increased 1.2% in Saskatchewan and it is only going to get worse. That means an additional 13,000 people in Saskatchewan are falling into poverty every year, simply because inflation is driving their costs through the roof.
Why is the government driving low-income families in Saskatoon West deeper into poverty with its high-spending, high-inflation policies?
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