- Member of Parliament
- Conservative
- Selkirk—Interlake—Eastman
- Manitoba
- Voting Attendance: 68%
- Expenses Last Quarter: $140,796.07
- Government Page
- Dec/12/22 12:34:47 p.m.
- Watch
- Re: Bill S-8
Mr. Speaker, what is it going to take to list the IRGC as a terrorist organization? The IRGC shot down PS752, which was done intentionally as a terrorist act. It funds Hamas, Hezbollah and other terrorist organizations throughout the world. It continues to commit all sorts of atrocities against its own civilians in Iran. Now it is participating in a defence co-operation agreement with Russia in the war in Ukraine by having kamikaze drones flown into civilian infrastructure to make winter long, cold and hard for Ukrainians.
Why will the government not wake up and finally list the IRGC as a terrorist organization, as Parliament called for unanimously in 2018?
111 words
All Topics
- Hear!
- Rabble!
- add
- star_border
- share
- Oct/18/22 12:58:38 p.m.
- Watch
Madam Speaker, it is a privilege to rise and close the debate this morning on this important concurrence motion.
I was disappointed to hear the member Winnipeg North say that he wanted to shut down this debate on the condemnation of the Russian invasion and genocide being committed in Ukraine. We need to reaffirm our position of standing with the innocent people of Ukraine, who are now civilian targets of the Russian Federation. We know Russia has been brutally attacking infrastructure, as well as places like hospitals, apartment buildings, and using not just cruise missiles and artillery but kamikaze drones it has acquired from Iran.
We have to stand against these terrorist actions that the Russian Federation has taken. We have to continue to point out that when it is brutalizing the innocent people of Ukraine, it is committing war crimes. When it is wildly saying that it is going to try to take away Ukraine's language, culture and, again, revisiting that Stalin era under the Soviet Union of the Holodomor when it tried to stamp out Ukrainian nationalism, we have to call it what it is: an atrocity, a genocide. Everyone who is responsible for raping women, murdering children, attacking seniors in Ukraine must be held to account before a higher authority.
I want to thank my colleague from Bruce—Grey—Owen Sound for his articulation of what Canada could do, and should do more, in support of the Ukrainian forces in their war of defending their territory from the barbarians of the north.
Russia continues to recruit and conscript more Russian men to join the battle. It continues to reach out and hire mercenaries from places like Syria and Chechnya, using the Wagner Group, which should be listed as a terrorist organization. We are now hearing that the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps, RGC, of Iran is also fighting in Ukraine to support Russian efforts.
We have to ensure that we are properly equipping all the Ukrainian armed forces and meeting the demands and requests they have made of Canada and our allies. As has already been articulated by the member for Bruce—Grey—Owen Sound, we are sitting on a fleet of armoured vehicles, Bisons, Coyotes and TLAV, all which are about to be retired and replaced with brand new super-Bisons, the new LAVs that are being built in Canada, at GDLS in London, Ontario. Those will be replacing this fleet very shortly.
Why are we not sending those LAVs. These armoured vehicles have proven themselves in places like Afghanistan, to support Ukrainian troops on the ground, providing them with the armoured ambulances, the Bison ambulances, so they can get their wounded off the front lines and into hospitals. We need to actually provide them with Role 3 Field Hospitals. We bought a bunch to support Canada's pandemic efforts. We know these mobile hospitals are sitting in containers, never used. Let us put them on a plane and get them over there so Ukraine can properly triage battlefield wounds, save lives and help soldiers recover.
One part of the motion also calls on helping those who are resisting Putin's hypocrisy, who are opposing the war in Ukraine and are in Russia today. Just yesterday, I met with Bill Browder, who has advocated for the Sergei Magnitsky legislation around the world. I met with with Vladimir Kara-Murza's wife, Evgenia. Vladimir Kara-Murza, who is a political opponent of Vladimir Putin, has now been jailed on trumped up charges of high treason, He has been given a 22-year sentence. His crime is that he called out Vladimir Putin for his illegal invasion of Ukraine, a Russian criticizing a Russian.
We are talking about free speech, which no longer exists in Vladimir Putin's Russia. It is about ensuring people have informed debate. Of course, with the disinformation campaign put on by the Kremlin, there is no way to get the truth into the hands of the Russian public.
As Russia conscripts another 200,000-plus men to join the fight in Ukraine, people are leaving in droves and fleeing as refugees from Russia. It is not just having to deal with the displacement and the refugee crisis that has been created in Ukraine because of this illegal invasion, but fighting-age Russian men know this war is illegal. They know Putin is going to lose this war and they are not about to sacrifice their lives for a dictator. We have to provide them with the opportunity to flee the country and come to allied nations, including Canada, so they can have safe haven, because they are taking up a very principled stand as conscientious deserters. Therefore, we have to be there as they object to this unnecessary war.
I also want to comment on the comments by the new premier of Alberta, which has come up a few times today in debate. I will say this. She needs to educate herself on what is happening in the war in Ukraine. She needs to actually go and talk to the thousands of Ukrainian refugees who have now decided to call Alberta home. If she talked to those refugees, she would realize very quickly that neutrality, as she has suggested, is not an option. We cannot trust Vladimir Putin. He is a pathological liar. We cannot trust any piece of paper he has signed, because he has already violated the Minks 1 and 2 agreements, never mind throwing away the treaty on the nuclear disarmament of Ukraine, the Budapest memorandum. If we cannot trust him, how can we negotiate with him? How do we maintain a level of neutrality?
There is something to be said about respecting the will of their Parliament, the will of the people. Through free will, the people of Ukraine have demonstrated, first through the Orange Revolution and then the Euromaidan on the streets of Kyiv and across the country, that they want to have closer relationships with the West. They want to be a member of the European Union. They want to be a member of NATO. If the people want that, which is one thing that President Zelenskyy came to power on, then we had better support them, because that is a democratic right and a democratic thing to do.
I congratulate Premier Smith on her ability to get elected as the premier of Alberta. She is respecting the democratic process there. I hope she respects the free will under the democratic process that is taking place in Ukraine today and that she will support those people from Ukraine who have decided to call Alberta home.
1112 words
All Topics
- Hear!
- Rabble!
- add
- star_border
- share
- Mar/28/22 3:23:17 p.m.
- Watch
Mr. Speaker, I am proud to present, on behalf of Canadians from across the country, a petition that recognizes Russia's invasion of Ukraine, the human rights abuses taking place and the humanitarian situation that has evolved with the displaced people. There are 1.4 million Canadians of Ukrainian descent who would love to see more Ukrainian refugees come here.
They are calling on the government to expedite the process of bringing Ukrainian refugees to Canada by moving to a visa-free travel immigration system for Ukrainians rather than the current special visa system in place.
96 words
- Hear!
- Rabble!
- add
- star_border
- share
- Dec/7/21 5:11:07 p.m.
- Watch
Madam Speaker, I could go on forever.
If there had been leadership from the Liberals, the minister of defence, the minister of citizenship and immigration and refugees, the minister of foreign affairs and especially the Prime Minister himself, we would not be in this situation today. If we had not had that unnecessary and expensive election that was all about the Prime Minister's hubris, we would have had boots on the ground sooner, equipment in the airfield and people moved to safety.
There were so many controls put on the special forces in Kabul trying to get Afghan refugees out that they were not outside the wire. The government would not let them outside the wire. The Ukrainian special forces went and got a bunch of Canada-bound refugees and took them to Ukraine.
That is leadership.
138 words
All Topics
- Hear!
- Rabble!
- add
- star_border
- share
- Dec/7/21 5:10:05 p.m.
- Watch
Madam Speaker, the member from the NDP seems to forget that our Afghan interpreter refugee program was fully subscribed. People used it, and at the end it was just a trickle that was coming in. People who came here were proud to be coming to Canada. They became citizens and they sponsored their families to get to Canada as well.
I am very proud of that program. I am proud of our forces and the job they did in fighting for women, girls and those who could not stand up for themselves in Afghanistan, in liberating villages and in fighting the tough fights in and around Kandahar. We need to be there with those veterans now as they are trying to get their friends and family out.
127 words
All Topics
- Hear!
- Rabble!
- add
- star_border
- share
- Dec/7/21 5:07:40 p.m.
- Watch
Madam Speaker, why would we want to split this work up over three committees, when those three committees can be doing other work? We should be having a special committee, as we have done in the past, such as in the previous Parliament, on Canada-China relations. There have been other committees in the past, like the special committee on the war in Afghanistan, which operated through Parliament the entire time and was outside the Standing Committee on National Defence.
This would be a short-term committee to look at how the government failed and how we can correct it so we can get better in the future. If the member does not want to learn from the mistakes his government has made, I can see that. He has always been in here as an apologist, trying to orchestrate the cover-ups that are so important to the front benches.
If the member is sincere about saving lives, let us get this committee to work. Let us find out what is happening and make sure we can come up with ideas on how to go forward.
186 words
All Topics
- Hear!
- Rabble!
- add
- star_border
- share
- Dec/7/21 4:56:07 p.m.
- Watch
Madam Speaker, I will be splitting my time with the member for Bruce—Grey—Owen Sound, who is someone I am honoured to serve with. As a veteran, he has done numerous missions and tours in Afghanistan and I am looking forward to his comments later. I know that sometimes he can be a little “rough” around the edges, but we are looking forward to his comments.
I am glad to be able to speak to the motion we brought forward on this day of supply, which is asking to set up a special committee to look into the crisis in Afghanistan and get our friends, allies and citizens out of Afghanistan after it fell to the Taliban; to find out what lessons we can learn so we do not make these mistakes again; and to find out why this was not made a higher priority by the government.
It should not have been a surprise to the Prime Minister or anyone in cabinet. We know that on May 2, 2019, CSIS presented a report that said that if the United States decided to withdraw from Afghanistan, the Taliban would recapture the entire country, including the city of Kabul, in very short order. That report was in 2019. Then, of course, Donald Trump, when he was still president of the United States, announced on February 29, 2020 that he was officially withdrawing and winding down U.S. operations in Afghanistan. Of course, the coalition that Canada had been a part of in Afghanistan would not be able to be sustained without the U.S. in theatre.
The question becomes this: If CSIS warned, based upon sound intelligence, that Afghanistan would be quickly captured by the Taliban, and Donald Trump announced the withdrawal in February 2020, why did the government not act? Instead of planning for the withdrawal and making sure we got our interpreters out before the country started to fall under the control of the brutal Taliban and the harsh conditions that exist there today, we could have been moving people out. Instead, the Prime Minister planned for a selfish and unnecessary, $650-million election. That is despicable.
Many of us on this side of the House and even members on the other side were getting contacted by veterans of the Canadian Armed Forces. They were pleading with all of us to get their friends who were over there out. These were people they served alongside, who supported them as interpreters and drivers and made sure their base camps and forward-operating locations were safe and secure. They served together. They were a team. We lost 158 Canadian soldiers, and over 40,000 served. Our Canadian veterans who served developed great relationships and considered their allies to be brothers and sisters in arms. To then see the government turn its back on these allies was so disheartening.
The true heroes throughout all of this have been those veterans. I would like to mention guys like Corey Shelson, Tim and Jamie Laidler, General David Fraser and General Denis Thompson, among others who have really done yeoman's service in organizing and getting people out of Afghanistan. In particular, because I and my office have been working closely with him, I want to highlight Robin Rickards from Thunder Bay.
Robin has had multiple tours in Afghanistan. He started contacting me over six years ago regarding getting these interpreters out of the country. Under the previous Conservative government, we had a special immigration program for Afghanistan interpreters. It got filled up; people quit applying and it wound down. We were able to get a few more out after that, as the Leader of the Opposition mentioned this morning in his speech. However, the reality is that people like Corey just would not quit, and they forewarned the government and us as members of Parliament. I know the member for Thunder Bay—Rainy River worked incredibly closely with Robin as well.
Every time any of us contacted cabinet, whether it was the minister of defence, the minister of immigration, the minister of foreign affairs or the Prime Minister himself, it seemed to fall on deaf ears. Nothing seemed to happen until the fall of Kabul in the middle of a federal election.
These veterans, through the Veterans Transition Network and many other NGOs, raised money to fund the safe houses. Generous donations came in from veterans, current serving members and Canadians at large. They chartered flights, bought airline tickets and continued to build both the air bridge and the land bridge to safe havens for those who were left behind. Of course, because they were relying on generosity and because things started to heat up so desperately, the money for those safe houses started to run out. On behalf of those veterans, a number of us asked in this House and in writing if the Government of Canada would give the organizations $5 million, so that we could keep the safe houses open and keep those interpreters and their families, the hundreds of people who were in the safe houses, safe in Kabul. The government callously said no. Five million dollars is a drop in the bucket around this place, and it would have gone a long way to protecting Afghan interpreters who were waiting to be processed as applicants to come to Canada.
The people in the Veterans Transition Network really did a lot of heavy lifting. They were part of the group that identified and made sure that the people making claims to come to Canada as refugees had served with our forces and had all their documents in order. They were reaching out to Immigration, Refugees and Citizenship Canada to get all the applications processed, but unfortunately all of that kind of went up in smoke when the fall of Kabul happened. We saw the complete chaos that occurred at the Kabul airport.
Since that time in the middle of August, when we saw the chaos and craziness that happened, our allies, like Germany and the United States, have continued to move out the refugees and citizens at risk, as well as interpreters and support staff to their armed forces, without any problem. They have been chartering flights in and out of Kabul non-stop. That is why the United States is already sitting on something like over 40,000 refugees in the mainland.
However, we are not seeing that happen here. Why is the Government of Canada not chartering those flights or at least making sure there are tickets on commercial aircraft for all those applicants who are sitting there waiting in Kabul or Kandahar to get out?
The Liberals talk a good game. We see the minister of immigration almost throw his shoulder out every question period here, patting himself on the back for getting 4,000 Afghan refugees out so far. The Canadian Armed Forces identified over 23,600, yet IRCC has processed only 14,675 and there are only 4,000 here so far. That means there are 9,600 Afghan refugees, interpreters, LGBTQ community members, and ethnic and religious minorities like the Hindi, the Sikh and the Hazaras, all sitting there waiting to be processed. They made the applications, yet red tape seems to be holding them back.
I have to thank my staff. They have been dealing directly with Afghan refugees, with our interpreters and our friends and allies, including Canadian citizens who are still trapped in Afghanistan. Some of them had to leave Kabul when the safe houses closed. They went back to their homes only to find that they had either been burnt down or were being lived in by the Taliban themselves. There were actually notices issued to arrest them. I know some went back, saying, “If I turn myself in, maybe they won't kill my family and they'll execute only me.”
We have so many stories of people who served with our forces, who served as journalists and who have been left behind and given up on Canada. That is not the Canada we are supposed to be. We are supposed to be the Canada that, because of the great work of our men and women in uniform who go out there and right the evils in the world, stands up for those who cannot stand up for themselves. Those people sacrificed blood and treasure in serving Canada. Let us support our veterans and let us bring home those Afghan allies who served with us.
1424 words
All Topics
- Hear!
- Rabble!
- add
- star_border
- share
- Dec/1/21 3:09:31 p.m.
- Watch
Mr. Speaker, our veterans and all of those non-governmental organizations had to step up because this government did not. Our Afghan interpreters and support staff have been left behind to face the brutality of the Taliban who are hunting them down as we speak. Our veterans are doing everything in their power to get people out of harm's way, including chartering their own planes to take them to safe third countries, but it seems the Prime Minister only cared about this when it was happening during the election.
On behalf of our veterans, on behalf of members of the Canadian Armed Forces and on behalf of the 40,000 Afghan nationals he promised to bring to Canada, on exactly what date will the Prime Minister bring these Afghans to Canada?
132 words
- Hear!
- Rabble!
- add
- star_border
- share
- Dec/1/21 3:08:16 p.m.
- Watch
Mr. Speaker, I can tell the Prime Minister that Canada's veterans have stepped up and done more than their share to protect their Afghan friends who were left behind. They set up safe houses to protect hundreds of Afghan interpreters and their families, but when these veteran-operated safe houses came to the government and asked for $5 million, the Liberals said no. Our Afghan friends were forced to leave, and now they are trying to escape the clutches of the Taliban.
I will ask the Prime Minister again: Can the Prime Minister tell the House and the 40,000 Afghan refugees exactly when they can expect to come to Canada?
112 words
- Hear!
- Rabble!
- add
- star_border
- share
- Dec/1/21 3:06:57 p.m.
- Watch
Mr. Speaker, when Afghanistan fell to the Taliban earlier this year, thousands of Afghans who worked alongside our troops were led to believe by the Prime Minister that Canada would keep them safe. National Defence has received over 23,000 applications from Afghan interpreters and support staff who served with us, yet Immigration, Refugees and Citizenship Canada is only processing 14,500 applications. That means that over 9,000 Afghan interpreters and support staff have not been invited to apply.
When will the Prime Minister bring to Canada the 40,000 Afghan nationals he promised?
95 words
- Hear!
- Rabble!
- add
- star_border
- share
- menumenu
- notificationsnotifications
- home
- mailmail
- searchsearch
