SoVote

Don Davies

Member of Parliament
Member of the National Security and Intelligence Committee of Parliamentarians
NDP

Vancouver Kingsway
British Columbia
Voting Attendance: 59%
Expenses Last Quarter: $153,893.57

Government Page

May/8/24 7:44:42 p.m.
Watch
Re: Bill C-59

Madam Speaker, the member should know about free things from government, because he gets free dental care, and so do his children. I do not see him giving that back. I have not heard of a Conservative giving back their free dental care yet. By the way, dental care, of course, is not free; it is paid for, but we believe on this side of the House that, collectively, by pooling our resources, we can make sure that every person can get access to primary health care. It is the foundation of our Canadian health care system, so I think that is a wise expenditure of money. More to the point, I have already gone through a couple of examples where Bill C-59 would return money to taxpayers. It would take 5% of the GST off new homebuilding, which is returning money to our home builders. It would take 5% off the GST for counselling services, returning money so that people can maybe afford to get the mental health support they need. What I would ask my hon. colleague is this: Why does he not support the bill, which would return money to important parts of our economy, instead of holding us up and costing taxpayers $450,000 tonight to have this absolutely avoidable and nonsensical debate?

218 words

Context: House Hansard - 286 - Feb/27/24

Mr. Don Davies (Vancouver Kingsway, NDP)

Feb/27/24 5:12:18 p.m.
Watch

Madam Speaker, one thing the New Democrats agree with the Conservatives on is that it is always wrong when taxpayer dollars are wasted in unnecessary procurement. The structural problem here is a series of successive federal governments that contract out work instead of using the public sector to provide these services. I was in the House when I watched the Conservatives contract out the Phoenix pay system, which was supposed to save $80 million. It ended up costing over $2 billion, and it does not even work. Now, we see the Liberals contract out this work to ArriveCAN, and we see similar results. Does my hon. colleague not agree with the NDP that it is time we use the talents and the skills of Canada's public servants to deliver these kinds of services, instead of giving money to the private sector contractors who are more interested in profit and the ability to abscond with money than they are in providing real value to the taxpayers of this country?

169 words

Context: House Hansard - 176 - Mar/30/23

Mr. Don Davies (Vancouver Kingsway, NDP)

Mar/30/23 2:49:37 p.m.
Watch

Mr. Speaker, Canadians need to know their government is using public money responsibly, especially when it comes to their health. However, the Liberals are refusing to tell taxpayers how much money they lost on a failed $200-million vaccine factory in the health minister's own riding, a scheme that did not produce a single dose of the COVID vaccine. When will the Liberals do the right thing and invest in a public drug manufacturer instead of no-strings-attached giveaways to big pharma?

84 words

Context: House Hansard - 119 - Oct/27/22

Mr. Don Davies

Oct/27/22 6:07:53 p.m.
Watch
Re: Bill C-31

Mr. Speaker, I remember the words of J.S. Woodsworth, who said, “What we desire for ourselves, we wish for all.” I think that this is an excellent guiding principle as a matter of good citizenship and good governance. If I flip that around, I think of the utter hypocrisy of people in the House voting against providing dental care to Canada's poorest citizens, while they themselves get their teeth fixed, their spouses' teeth fixed and their children's teeth fixed, not paid for by them but paid for by the taxpayers. The leader of the official opposition has been in the House since he was 25 years old. He has been having his teeth fixed, paid for by the taxpayers, since he was 25, and he is going to stand in the House and say that people who make under $70,000 should not have dental insurance. Seniors over 65, do we know how many seniors over 65 make under $70,000 a year and have no dental insurance? Almost all of them. That is who the NDP is going to bring dental care to. I want to know what Conservatives will say to them next election.

201 words

All Topics

SoVote

Member of the National Security and Intelligence Committee of Parliamentarians

Don Davies