:
Normally I have a pretty good connection here, but thank you for that. It might be resolved, but if it continues, perhaps I can get IT support. If it's necessary, I'll let someone else take my spot and then pick up where I leave off.
In my remarks, I was just expressing this heartfelt conviction I have that if proroguing during COVID-19 is not deemed to be a good reason, we have a real problem, because when you look at past prorogations, even the one in 2008 and then the one in 2009, when Prime Minister Stephen Harper used his prerogative to prorogue, all the comments made in the media were that these prorogations were the result of the government's need to assess the economic uncertainty and impact and reset the agenda.
I have several quotes from Dimitri Soudas. In 2009, in the Toronto Star, he was quoted as saying that with the recession easing, now “is the time to engage with constituents, stakeholders and businesses in order to listen to Canadians, identify priorities and to set the next stage of our agenda.” This points to the relationship between the economic recession we were under, which was starting to lift, and the need to then re-evaluate and reset the agenda, which is very consistent with what [Technical difficulty—Editor] testified to and consistent with the prorogation report we've all seen and read at this point.
It's just a parallel. In comparison, it seems that this rationale was good enough for the general public and members of Parliament back in 2009, and what we're dealing with is a public health crisis first, but an economic crisis that's 10 times greater, at least, than what we saw in 2008 and 2009. I think that really underscores that the rationale provided should be, and is, a great reason for resetting the agenda and evaluating the priorities of Canadians and how to recover from this deep social and economic impact that COVID-19 has caused, and I would say, the public health measures that have been utilized to protect, to the greatest extent possible, human health and human life across Canada.
I would like to actually reference a document that I've been reading. I think it's really pertinent to our debate today. It's the six-month update, called “The Social and Economic Impacts of COVID-19”. It was published in September 2020 by the chief statistician of Canada. It's a sizable document, so I wouldn't blame anybody for not reading it, yet I found it very interesting. It's 134 pages, and it outlines the really deep social and economic impacts of COVID-19 that we were all dealing with at the moment in time when our decided to use his prerogative to ask for prorogation and re-evaluate the government's priorities and reset the agenda. I think anyone can access this document. It's publicly available, and it's extremely useful in terms of outlining the depth of the impact on our economy.
I draw your attention to a number of points here that are also really reflected in the throne speech. I remember that in our last meeting I spent quite a bit of time delineating how the consultation process during prorogation was really in depth and thorough.
It really engaged members of Parliament. It engaged other parties in the discussions. It really looked at what data and evidence we had and what the priorities should be. I feel that the throne speech, although with broad strokes, of course—with some continuity, for sure, from the original priorities that were outlined in the platform prior, even continuity with the previous throne speech—largely reflected the needs that were expressed by my constituents and, I believe, Canadians in general.
I would go even further today and say that the needs that were reflected in the broad strokes of that new throne speech actually respond effectively to the major impacts that were outlined by the chief statistician of Canada in this 134-page document that I think is an incredible body of work. I'm not sure how many people it must have taken to produce such an in-depth report. I'm sure there were a lot of people behind putting this together. It's really useful.
I would like to quote something from the forward that I think is really important to keep in mind. It highlights the need for an inclusive, equitable recovery. The chief statistician of Canada wrote this forward, so it's a quote from him. His name is Anil Arora. He says:
The crisis has also laid bare many of the social and economic hardships facing marginalized Canadians, raising fundamental questions about the inclusiveness of the recovery.
That's one piece, I think, of an important argument to be made, which is to look at that statement, look at the evidence and really look at how the throne speech responds to that and how it outlines an inclusive, resilient recovery plan—again, in broad strokes because a throne speech is, as we know, not a detailed plan. It doesn't outline every single thing that the government is going to do in full detail, of course. I don't think it would be reasonable for us to expect that in a throne speech.
I would also say that Anil Arora says:
Responding effectively to a crisis requires timely, credible information. COVID-19 has substantially increased the demand for data and analyses that illuminate the challenges facing Canadians as households, businesses, and governments gravitate toward a new normal.
There's a lot of really good information in this document. I would like to just start by highlighting a few of the key findings that I think are really pertinent.
One of the key findings—and this is on page four—is that:
The health impacts of COVID-19 go beyond the effects of the virus.
One statistic that I think is worth pointing out is that:
The pandemic has had unprecedented impacts on the quality of life of Canadians, who have reported their lowest levels of life satisfaction since data became available in 2003.
That's one point. People report, and that's self-reported data. I would say that people's perceptions of their life satisfaction is the only thing that matters when doing that type of research. It's their perception of their quality of life. It's a good indicator of how much this has impacted Canadians.
Also, it says:
Fewer Canadians reported being in very good or excellent mental health—with young Canadians registering the largest declines.
Also, the report points out what it calls “excess mortality”. That's kind of a strange term. Essentially, looking at population level data, we would be able to predict the anticipated mortality rate of Canadians, and it graphs that out. It shows how many more deaths there have been during this crisis than what would normally be anticipated in the normal cycle of life of Canadians. That's another statistic in here that I think is very important.
Another key finding is that the economic impacts of COVID-19 have been uneven across population groups. I think this is really important for us to realize. I know that many other colleagues feel just as passionately as I do about the importance of supporting segments of the population that are marginalized and that have been disproportionately impacted by COVID-19.
The report states:
The historic declines in economic activity disproportionately affected many vulnerable Canadians, including women, youth, new immigrants, visible minorities and lower-wage workers.
Visible minorities are overrepresented in sectors hardest hit by the pandemic, including food and accommodation services, contributing to high rates of unemployment.
We also see the research data pointing to the impact on indigenous populations:
36% of Indigenous participants reported that the pandemic had an impact on their ability to meet financial obligations or essential needs, compared with 25% of non-Indigenous participants.
That's a significant increase; that's 11% over non-indigenous individuals who participated. This points to the inequity we're seeing within the pandemic itself, and I think it's part of how the pandemic response needs to reflect the inequities that we see across the impacts.
Let me go even a little bit further here:
The impact of COVID-19 on economic activity has been unprecedented and highly uneven across sectors.
This is another point that the chief statistician said was a key finding of this extensive report. Again, think back to the throne speech that outlined supports for hardest-hit industries. I would add here that we're still trying to get that support through Parliament and to get some of the essential supports for the hardest-hit industries actually passed through the House of Commons. It is unfortunate that this is being delayed.
The report states:
The impact of COVID-19 on certain sectors, particularly those that provide consumer-facing services and rely more on travel and tourism, has been particularly severe. Lower-wage services have been impacted to a much greater extent than high-wage services.
This means that individuals who are staffing the firms that offer these lower-wage positions are ones that are also being impacted, because the economic impacts are hitting the service sector and consumer-facing services much harder. I think we've all seen that in retail, probably in our local communities. I've certainly heard it from my chamber of commerce and my business improvement area over and over, that these are the industries that have been hardest hit.
The report states:
The recovery in jobs will depend in large part on the ability of many businesses to adapt to changes in financial and operating conditions, including more uncertain demand for their products and services.
The report also goes into how this pandemic is having a “transformative impact” on existing business models. Similarly, businesses are having to digitalize. Obviously, more people are teleworking. In some instances, some of these lower-wage workers are also at much higher risk of having robotics or automation replace their jobs. This is a big trend within this report as well. In fact, there are many risks and many impacts on those lower-wage workers that the rest of us who are higher-wage don't feel and experience to the same degree.
Airline passenger volumes, measured year over year, remained down 94% in June. As of July, payroll employment in accommodation and food services industries was at about two-thirds of its pre-COVID level, so it was down one-third.
Again, these impacts were at that time. This report really outlines the impacts between when the pandemic hit, and basically, August. The report was produced in September, so it was actually used as a platform of foundational data that could then help inform the consultation process that was being undertaken at the same time.
If you keep drawing the lines between what the data tells us and what the throne speech says, I think you understand that we're not making this up. It made sense. It was rational. It was a good thing to do, to pause and reset the agenda and evaluate where we were at.
One of the other key findings that is important on the social impact side is that the social impacts have also been uneven. There have been greater impacts on those population groups with pre-existing vulnerabilities. This included immigrants and visible minorities, who, as I've already said, are overrepresented as frontline workers. They were also put at greater risk of contracting COVID-19, because many of them were on the front lines, working throughout the pandemic.
Also, it's important to point out that the data showed that visible minorities had perceived and self-reported an increase in harassment, attacks and stigma since the pandemic began. The rates were highest among Chinese, Korean and Southeast Asian participants.
I take this very seriously. Not only are visible minorities working in the pandemic on the front lines more hit by the economic impacts, putting themselves more at risk of contracting COVID-19, but they are also experiencing harassment, attacks and stigmatization as a result. Obviously, I'm really not happy about this. It's very hard to shoulder this and even process it, because it's exacerbating vulnerability on top of vulnerability and really providing evidence as to why we might see this resurgence in movements that are seeking greater equity for populations, or subpopulations, that are vulnerable and highly impacted by COVID-19.
Also, it's important to note that social isolation due to COVID had heightened the risk of family violence. From victim services, 54% of respondents reported an increase in the number of victims of domestic violence served between mid-March and early July.
Again, this highlights quite a few different important findings. If you look at the throne speech, again, you can make direct connections between what appears in the throne speech and some of the data that has been collected.
Another key finding is managing the pandemic, moving forward. Canadians are willing to take precautions to slow the spread of COVID-19, but there are differences across groups, and that was apparent from the data. One example was that 90% or more of Canadians said they would take precautions such as handwashing, avoiding crowds and wearing masks. What I found encouraging about this particular portion of the report was that it shows how much Canadians in general are willing to do in order to protect the health and lives of others. It was very encouraging to me to think that we have data that shows that.
That data was shown to fluctuate depending on the severity and the number of cases that people were aware of. Think about how public health keeps reporting our daily numbers and how some of our extremely reputable doctors are putting that data out there to keep us all informed. That actually impacts Canadians quite a bit in terms of their willingness to protect others and take the pandemic seriously.
It's really important that this data is put out there because the data that the chief statistician gathered shows that it does impact what people are willing to do and give up in terms of the disruption to their lives. They understand that as case numbers are increasing, they have to do more and they have to abide by these public health measures. There's a larger degree of compliance as a result of their being aware of the case numbers going up.
These are all important points for us to keep in mind when we're thinking about the rationale for prorogation and making the link back to.... I'm not being unreasonable here. If former prime minister Stephen Harper prorogued for a recession that pales in comparison to this pandemic, then certainly the economic impacts of COVID-19 would merit the same consideration and provide a perfectly reasonable rationale for proroguing Parliament.
There were other findings here that I think are important. I'll try not to repeat myself. On changes in Canadians' concerns and response to COVID-19, it says that, as restrictions are lifted and activities resume, social interactions increase, particularly among youth, Canadian born and those living outside central Canada.
There are some other findings here:
Concerns remain about resuming certain activities such as attending events, travelling by airplane, and gathering in large groups—particularly among seniors, immigrants, and Ontarians.
Many Canadians at high risk of severe outcomes due to COVID-19 said that they would try to continue to work from home.
There are many other findings, but I think we see that as restrictions were lifted, the compliance with some of those public health restrictions were less. As such, we've seen a second wave emerge and now we're probably on the cusp of what we would call a third wave of COVID-19, which is deeply concerning.
I wanted to make a few other points about the health risk of resuming activities and willingness to take precautions, which I think is important to highlight. It is important to note that the throne speech recentred on the health needs of Canadians. That's why the throne speech, if you actually look at it, really does focus and is structured in a way....
We all were quite excited between the first and second wave. I certainly felt an energy that we were coming out of this. Then it quickly came grinding to a halt when we realized for sure that there was going to be a second wave, which I think any person who has studied pandemics would have been able to predict. I don't think it was actually all that surprising.
I can definitely tell you that I was caught up in the thought of focusing on recovery and addressing the inequities in our country and many of the other issues that are going to be important coming out of this.
When you look at how the throne speech is structured, it has four foundations. The first one was protecting Canadians from COVID-19. The second one was helping Canadians in businesses through the pandemic, and then building back better.
I remember one of the witnesses calling it a catchphrase. I have lots to say about that. It's not a catchphrase to me. It's a really important concept that is an inspiring vision for a new economy that can emerge stronger, more resilient, more inclusive, more equitable and more sustainable for the planet. That is something I would work until the day I die to achieve. It's something I believe in.
Then the last one was to stand up for who we are as Canadians.
That's how the throne speech was structured, so it really centres on protecting Canadians, first and foremost, from COVID-19. It then talks about how to get Canadians and businesses through the pandemic, and then how we recover in terms of building back better and standing up for Canadians.
I really do feel that it reflects a lot of the data, even just in the way that it's structured.
I am going to make a few more points here about how concerns about overwhelming the health care system remained at that point and ensuring that we made workplaces safe. Approximately half of at-risk individuals who were employed rated their risk among employed individuals as higher. In terms of absolute numbers, sectors with the highest estimated number of workers at risk of adverse outcomes of COVID-19 were in health care and social assistance. That's not surprising given those folks were working on the front lines and caring for people during the pandemic in retail trade; manufacturing; construction; professional, scientific and technical services; and transportation and warehousing.
You can see how many of these were considered essential services, and those individuals were definitely at higher risk of contracting COVID-19 and, in many cases, were also at greater risk of having underlying health conditions as well.
I would just like to skip to another section in this report, which I think really speaks to the economic impacts and the depth of the economic impacts. This is on page 44. Maybe I'll just cover the summary. The summary is on page 43.
Regarding economic impacts and recovery related to the pandemic, “Output is recovering as businesses reopen” so, again, this was written in a time when some businesses were able to reopen to a degree, but there were “stark differences across sectors. Output in accommodation and food services in June was at 55% of its pre-pandemic level.”
Another finding was that, “Employment is recovering, but steep losses remain in certain highly impacted sectors.” Again, “Youth, less educated workers, women, recent immigrants, and temporary employees” were hit the hardest.
“Prior to the pandemic” is a summary, and I have more detail on some of these points that I think is important, but firm creation is in the start-up space. Before the pandemic, new businesses being launched were on an upswing. There had been a rise in the number of businesses that were being started in Canada, and the financial position of the firms had been improving. It continues:
Closures rose dramatically during the shutdowns as employees left payrolls—62,600 business closures were observed in May, 29% less than in April but still 59% higher than pre-COVID-19 levels observed in February.
It's important to remember that those shutdowns weren't complete closures of those businesses. They were shutdowns due to the public health measures that were implemented by provinces and territories to protect people from contracting COVID-19.
There are also structural challenges in heavily affected sectors. The retail sector rebounded quickly from storefront closures, as companies developed and enhanced their online platforms. Some of them were able to move online and did rebound somewhat. Again, they were nowhere near their pre-pandemic levels, but it's a good sign that businesses can pivot, start to change their business models and rebound somewhat.
In terms of the unprecedented impact of COVID-19 on the economy, we can see unprecedented declines in output. There's a really great graph on page 44 of the report that I keep referring to. It shows what the output in our economy was from 2007 to 2020. You can see on the graph the size and scope of the 2008-09 recession. Annual GDP fell 2.9% in 2009. You can compare that with the economic growth over the period of 2018-19, and even prior to that there's considerable economic growth. You can compare that with the COVID-19 pandemic, with severe declines in household spending, business investment and trade, all of which amount to about five times the impact of the 2008-09 recession.
The chief statistician or the team that wrote this report.... I don't pretend that the chief statistician necessarily wrote the entire report; they probably had a team of people helping. It says, “As a purposeful, policy-based response to a health crisis, the COVID-19 restrictions brought about severe contractions in most industrial sectors, including in many service-based industries that typically support the economy during conventional downturns.”
I have another note that I think is important to recognize. I have some other articles on the difference between the 2008-09 recession and the COVID-19 pandemic. There's a great article in First Policy Response that compiles a whole bunch of opinions from different experts who talk about how the economic impact of COVID-19 is far greater and much different qualitatively than that of the 2008-09 recession.
The 2008-09 recession was a demand-side recession. This is totally different from what we have seen during COVID-19, which is a supply-side shock recession. We would therefore expect it to be not only much greater, but different in kind. It requires a very different set of measures, a different way of thinking and a different set of policies and strategies for dealing with it. I won't go into depth on that right now, but I think that's important.
It's also important that the chief statistician outlines, “The road to recovery will involve major adaptations for businesses and households, which pose challenges for an equitable and resilient recovery.” That's interesting when you think about how we've identified that the impacts of COVID-19 have not been equally distributed. In fact, they've impacted populations that were already much more marginalized or vulnerable. I think the chief statistician is saying that this creates additional challenges for our recovery.
The chief statistician's report also says:
During [the second quarter of 2020], household spending fell by a record 13% as families faced heightened levels of job and income uncertainty.
Employment earnings fell by almost 9% in the second quarter. At the same time, household disposable income rose by almost 11%....
This is really important for us to think when we are thinking about recovery. We saw that household spending fell by a record 13% as families faced the uncertainty of the pandemic and income loss, and employment earnings fell almost the same amount—not quite but 9%—in that second quarter. At the same time, due to our government's measures and supports, the COVID-19 relief, economic relief or financial relief supports, disposable income rose by almost 11%.
That's interesting when you think about the elasticity of market and the supply-side shock on the economy. When you put money into the pockets of Canadians to help them get through a crisis, and to some degree there's an increase in their disposable income, they're not spending it.
This pushed the household savings rate to just over 28%, up from about 8% in the first quarter of 2020. Again, when the keeps saying that the economy's going to come roaring back, this is what he's talking about. Why is it going to come back? We are already seeing the chief financial advisers for, I believe, TD and CIBC.... I've been putting these bits of information out there as I see the articles. They're already saying that the rebound of our economy is starting to happen. There's evidence of that.
Again, this is the result of severe declines in most types of economic activity, but in terms of our fiscal measures and support measures, I think we can see that they were targeted. Some of those were outlined in the throne speech. Some of them were continued on, but a lot of them were restructured around that time as well. If you remember, the wage subsidy, for example, was completely restructured to be indexed to the revenue loss of the businesses that are out there. That makes perfect sense.
I think opposition parties were in agreement that those revisions and adaptations of that support were important to not only support businesses to get through this but also to help the support be structured in a way that allows them to actually recover and lift them out of the pandemic. That has created an impact on their businesses.
To me, again, this just seems like it's all very rational and based in evidence. I know that's what I hang my hat on, that as a party and as a government, we've been putting the health and safety of Canadians first. We've been seeking evidence and consulting with key stakeholders across this country, including opposition parties, and attempting to implement measures that are the most effective at both protecting Canadians' health and safety, and helping our economy recover and Canadians get through the crisis. To me, that gives me reassurance.
Historic declines in labour market activity were another impact of COVID-19. It continues, “Employment losses totaled 3 million from February to April, almost 2 million of which were in full-time work.” This is on page 47 of that report. “Employment rose by 1.9 million from April to August. Total employment in August was 5.3% below its pre-pandemic level.” This shows how quickly businesses started to recover and unemployment started to decrease as we came out of the first wave of COVID-19.
It still was below pre-pandemic levels, of course, because we hadn't gotten through the crisis yet, and certainly we know now that the second wave of COVID-19 was much worse so the impact on our economy has only gotten greater as a result of managing this crisis through the second wave.
Now, perhaps we could have a third wave, which could be avoided, quite honestly. If we stuck with our public health measures and didn't lift them prematurely, I think we could avoid a third wave, which would benefit our economy and all of Canadians as well as their health. Of course, the most important part of dealing with a pandemic is the health and safety of people.
I was really heartened by the fact that the called for March 11 to be a day to observe the incredible loss of life during COVID-19. I don't know how many people have been impacted by this exactly, but I know that 22,269 people have lost their lives in this pandemic over the last year.
I think about the ripple effects on all of the people who were in their families, all of the friends, all of the communities that are experiencing those losses, and we need to remind ourselves that every life matters, every single life matters. We can't ever become desensitized to the loss of life that's occurred from this pandemic.
While most of my speech has focused on the depth of impact on our economy and on our society, I really think that the impact and the loss of human life is something that we can never lose sight of.
Maybe I'll leave it there for the moment because I have so much more to say and there are so many more good points in here, but this might be a good time for me to take a moment. I feel myself getting a bit emotional, which is I think is natural, given how hard we've all been working for so long and how long I've just spoken for. That's a heartfelt reminder of the loss of human life that's happened in this pandemic, which I take very seriously.
Thank you, Madam Chair. I'll maybe resume again after some of my colleagues have had a few words, but that is a good place for me to stop for the moment.
Thank you.
During the committee meeting on December 10, we spoke about this motion, which was introduced in the wake of the prorogation. Mr. Turnbull opened the door to debate by saying that, if a pandemic didn't warrant a prorogation, he didn't know what it would take to warrant one. As I told you before, that's why we'll be part of history.
Did we foresee these events a year ago? We had all been elected for a few months and we were full of enthusiasm, in every committee. In the House, we were together. There was life on the Hill and in the lobbies of Parliament. We never missed an opportunity to give each other a good handshake or a hug. Now we almost exclusively meet virtually. A small minority of us are in the House. We can see the committee room, but it's empty. Only the staff are there. Right now, we all meet virtually. We're having experiences that no one could have predicted.
At this point, I think that our committee is more relevant than ever. We have a list of issues that we should consider significant. That said, the list must be modified, because the priorities are different from what they used to be. We've had the opportunity to learn the ins and outs of the procedures that we must implement.
Our committee should be one of the most active, after the Standing Committee on Health, of course, given that we're talking about a health crisis. It should be one of the most engaged and dynamic committees. We should be showing the public that our procedures are effective, and we should know how we can do better in a government during a pandemic.
However, nothing in the motion reflects this. The prorogation is being used as a symbol and the motion is being used as a way to prove that a prorogation wasn't necessary. Basically, this is undermining our fine government and parliamentary machinery and preventing us from moving forward on certain issues.
The members of the opposition parties tried to show that the WE Charity caused the issue, despite the many nuances provided by several witnesses. Some witnesses disagreed. They felt that it was necessary to prorogue Parliament in order to move forward with decisions on the pandemic and to give the government an opportunity to refocus on priorities that serve the interests of Canadians.
It's important to remember that we were the first government to propose a report after the prorogation. That public report was well received. We explained why, in this unprecedented situation, the prorogation was warranted.
I want to quote from the evidence given by Kathy L. Brock, a political studies professor at Queen's University. She said the following about the reasons for the prorogation last August:
First, yes, to reset, but also to emphasize what the government priorities are in a changed circumstance ...
Second, if you look at 2020, this was a government that was tired. This was a government that was under a lot of pressure. This is when a government makes very serious mistakes, and they are exposed to the public as failures of government, malfeasance or misdemeanours of some type, when in fact they're due to errors of exhaustion.
This gave the government and the public sector time to regain their energy.
I want to talk to you about this.
This may sound trite, but I wasn't fortunate enough to receive a high level of education in my youth. However, I enjoyed being a welder for 21 years, a good part of my life. Afterwards, I went back to university to become a teacher.
I want to talk to you about the most important issue, which is the psychological fatigue and human fatigue tied to the work environment. We experience psychological fatigue on a daily basis. Every day, we contact people, we work in committees and we meet with witnesses.
During a pandemic, almost nothing positive happens. We're all teleworking and staying at home. I think that this is extremely difficult on a psychological level. Together, we need to show the public that we're human, that we're here, that we're listening to our constituents and that we're strong, despite all the deaths.
Personally, this has affected me directly, since I'm the Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister of Seniors. During the pandemic, I was the one in office, and I still am. It hurts me a great deal when someone takes the opportunity to make political hay on the backs of seniors. It hurts me tremendously to hear someone say that the deaths are related to politics.
This pressure has been mounting for ages, and it just concerns the psychological aspect. I could go on and on. Our committees will need to do more work on social isolation and the psychological damage experienced during a crisis. As you can see, we're all very comfortable. Some people are working from their kitchens or the great outdoors, while others are working in offices or nice spaces. However, this isn't how things really are.
I've attended Zoom meetings. Sometimes, the presidents of certain associations had to move into a closet or a small room because their three children were running around the house. They had to seclude themselves in places where they could access the Internet. This doesn't even take into account family pressure.
I'll address the importance of the Standing Committee on Procedure and House Affairs. At the last meeting, we opened a door, and it got me thinking. I wrote about anything that would support work-life balance and teleworking. I made a distinction between the two, but I'll save that for later. I really want to tell you how much talking to the members of the new committee made me think.
I now want to talk about my job as a welder.
When we felt psychological fatigue, it affected our work. We wondered whether we were in the right place and we called our work into question. It also affected our colleagues, our performance and our sleep. As members of Parliament, we're no different from anyone else. We sometimes have sleep issues, which affect our health. Lack of sleep can be linked to high blood pressure or diabetes, for example. We all have small hidden health issues. Experiencing stress, a pandemic and psychological distress isn't good for our health.
Queen's University professor Kathy L. Brock often said that this enabled us to regain our energy somewhat. Was the timing right or not? We discussed the matter. We'll have a chance to talk about it again a little later. I think that the timing was right.
Mr. Turnbull clearly explained the process after the first wave and the importance of preparing for the second wave.
I'll talk about fatigue. We just spoke about psychological distress. The professor was right on the money. However, she also talked about exhaustion caused by long working hours.
As members of Parliament, we're always meeting, always talking, and we're still being asked a lot about vaccines. I understand that we're in politics and that I also chose to get into politics.
There has never been such a great opportunity for us to work together. We shouldn't be using this opportunity to play politics. Sometimes, I find it really distasteful when a journalist's words, for example, are used in public or in the House to score points in the middle of a pandemic. Whether we like it or not, we must deal with this pandemic and we shouldn't use it to play politics.
We can politicize many other issues. Many issues are on the table. The House is continuing to sit as a result of the many support programs established during the pandemic.
I want to tell the opposition members that we looked everywhere for ideas and that there's no better consultation. For example, for the new horizons for seniors program, we worked with all the parties to ensure that seniors in every constituency in Canada could benefit from the program. The program criteria weren't established based on merit alone. They were established on a constituency-by-constituency basis, with a minimum requirement for each constituency. Several constituencies represented by opposition members benefited more from the program.
In the past, some constituencies didn't even apply for the new horizons for seniors program. These communities now have several projects. We're getting emails from members of the opposition parties thanking us for our work. This was the result of taking a step back.
With the minister's help, we consulted with all the parties so that we could invest an additional $20 million for seniors during the pandemic. These projects are being created to break isolation, to purchase new iPads, to provide Internet training or to teach seniors how to connect through Zoom or FaceTime. These are small, basic training sessions.
I've seen some great projects. I saw that people were offering online yoga classes for seniors. One teacher was doing yoga online to get seniors moving in their rooms, when they were isolated for the past four or five months with a bed, a chair and a sink. The physical distress that these seniors experienced is the same distress that Queen's University professor Kathy L. Brock described.
Exhaustion has been experienced everywhere. Young people have never watched so many television shows or played so many video games. As part of my family values, I like my children to move around, meet with friends and socialize.
You know that we all, as members of Parliament, have an active social life. Several of my activities take place on the weekends. My children are used to following me around or doing other activities where they meet people. Now they're cooped up in their rooms playing video games. This is psychologically unhealthy, but what else can we do?
No matter how much we introduce them to painting and music and try to innovate, we're also helping to isolate them. Psychological distress often goes hand in hand with physical distress. Everything is linked.
The prorogation gave the government a chance to take a step back and set new priorities.
Of course, for Canadians, the fight against COVID-19 is important. However, the economic recovery is also important. Mr. Turnbull talked about this. A great deal has been done.
It takes many measures to spend $300 billion. Is this perfect? No, nothing is perfect in this world. Nothing is perfect in a crisis where we must rush to make decisions. We're still debating the decision on the Canada recovery sickness benefit. None of the 338 members of the House of Commons anticipated that a worker returning from a trip down south would be eligible for these benefits while in quarantine. We didn't even think about travel at that point. We didn't think that the provincial governments would allow people to travel or that agencies would offer cheap trips down south, which created a difficult situation when people returned home. Everyone voted for this measure, but no one thought about this possibility, because we were making decisions quickly.
We often need to take a step back in order to move forward. Psychological and physical exhaustion can lead to mistakes. In politics, there isn't much room for error. I don't know how many questions we've received in the House about travellers returning to Canada. I don't know how many emails I've received about the fact that workers returning from trips would obtain $1,000 in compensation for lost earnings during their quarantine. We made this decision together and we must take responsibility for it. However, the opposition took this opportunity to try to show that we were making bad decisions.
Now we're discussing a prorogation that some people say shouldn't have taken place. However, the opposition members' questions clearly show that they had already decided why we prorogued Parliament. Several opposition members said that the prorogation should have taken place at the start, before we even knew the ins and outs of the situation, before we even knew that there would be a second wave and variants, and before we even knew how the vaccine development and negotiations would proceed.
At the time, we said only that we were working with seven different vaccine suppliers and that this would give Canada the largest range of vaccines in the world. Yet we heard only that we weren't doing anything about vaccines and that we were unable to govern because we were caught off guard by the $1,000 sent to travellers, even though this money stemmed from a measure that everyone supported. We missed a great opportunity to show Canadians that we were working together to fight the pandemic.
Queen's University professor Kathy L. Brock spoke about the reasons for the August prorogation. She said that the prorogation gave the government a chance to step back and set new priorities for Canadians, including the fight against COVID-19, but also the economic recovery. That's where my colleague Mr. Turnbull set the stage. We needed a fresh start, because we knew that there would be a tremendous impact on our economy, and therefore on our businesses. In constituencies like mine, in rural areas, micro-businesses are the largest employers.
When we have a factory with 40 employees, that's wonderful. In a rural area, we don't have office towers, we don't build more than three stories, and we don't have public transportation. However, 60% of the population doesn't have affordable high-speed Internet access. This sums up how isolated we are and shows the importance of working together in a rural area during a pandemic like COVID-19. We needed to take a step back and look at the big picture and to really refocus on the priorities in order to deal with the pandemic.
Speaking of decisions and taking a step back, do you think that we've been twiddling our thumbs? No. We've never done so many consultations. We've never talked so much. We've never prepared so thoroughly for after the pandemic. We're currently in the midst of the pandemic. However, we need to talk about what will happen afterwards, about the economic recovery. This recovery will depend on our decisions. The Standing Committee on Procedure and House Affairs really has a role to play in all this. We have many other things to do besides trying to play politics and undermine the government with this type of motion. We can talk about this later.
At the start, a move to vote was made because we had had a six-hour debate. No debate will be long enough to ensure that we can keep working together without undermining the government. The prorogation study launched in December involved a dozen witnesses. Since then, the vaccines have arrived, we're in the midst of distributing the vaccines to the provinces and territories and we're seeing the light at the end of the tunnel. I believe in this, and I've been waiting for this moment for a very long time. However, nothing will go back to normal, because many procedures must change now. Life won't go back to the way that it was before.
I don't know how long it will be until I can meet with my colleagues or give them a good, heartfelt handshake. To me, a handshake is the best sign of agreement and acknowledgement possible. With a good handshake or a “high five,” life is good and we move on. However, this will no longer exist. No one will dare to shake our hands in the coming years. We aren't talking about months, but years. Our way of doing things will change, and so will our closeness. Fear is here to stay. I'm very sorry to say this, but fear will linger.
We met with witnesses who started by telling us that the prorogation shouldn't have taken place and that it was a way to get out of a situation. They were right. We were getting out of a situation. We were getting out of a pandemic. However, their mind was made up for the wrong reasons. The witnesses aren't experiencing what we're going through on the ground. No one else has the opportunity to experience this apart from a member of Parliament who is getting involved in their community, speaking to their people and making calls to their constituents during the week and on the weekends.
For example, if you call someone in the Toronto Centre area or the National Capital Region, where a large portion of the population consists of public servants who are teleworking, who have never been subject to a salary penalty, who have adapted to working from home with government equipment, who haven't had to spend money and who no longer need to commute, you certainly won't see as much distress and people won't be as affected.
There are two main ways to cause someone distress: hit their family or hit their wallet. The pandemic has affected not only people's wallets and families, but people themselves. The situation is extremely difficult for people who have lost their jobs, for business owners who have had to close and reopen repeatedly, and for restaurant owners who have had to close their dining rooms.
In my constituency, producers have had to throw away tons of edible produce. We have a program in place to assist with produce donations to food banks. However, it wasn't possible to donate 20 tons of potatoes to a community centre. A community centre doesn't have the capacity to handle six truckloads of potatoes or to deliver the potatoes to food banks. The system wasn't designed to deal with a pandemic.
In addition, 10,000 hens had to be buried. I learned that some hens were bound for restaurants and some were bound for grocery stores. When hens are a certain size, they can't be sold at grocery stores. These hens are then bound for restaurants. Since the restaurants were closed, the hens had to be slaughtered and buried. This happened in my constituency. These decisions were extremely difficult to make. Nothing was perfect.
Furthermore, the ferries have been forgotten.
Last year, when the pandemic began, Quebec was affected by flooding. In my constituency, seven municipalities were affected by flooding. At the start of the pandemic, I was at the water's edge with my long boots, alongside my constituents. We helped people get equipment out and save animals. Since a dam was showing signs of weakness and was in danger of collapsing, army helicopters were brought in as backup to quickly evacuate families from their homes and take them to a community centre. We had to leave animals, horses and dogs behind. I experienced these things in my constituency.
Now we're being hit by this pandemic. Not everyone hit by this crisis last year was eligible for the programs. We try to provide the best programs possible, but nothing is perfect and we can't serve everyone. It's extremely important to step back, reflect on the situation, and provide data to decision-makers so that we can do better. In fact, that's what we did during the pandemic.
Despite all the evidence to that effect, at the December 10, January 28, February 16 and February 18 meetings, opposition members continued to say that the prorogation occurred only because of the WE Charity scandal. They had their minds made up from the start, even before the committee began its study on the reasons for the August 2020 prorogation. So why go any further? We have everything needed to prepare a report. The reasons for the prorogation have already been established. Several experts have said that the pandemic was reason enough to prorogue Parliament.
We're talking about an unprecedented health and economic crisis that has significantly affected the lives of all Canadians. It has taken the lives of thousands of people in our country. Since this is a global crisis, we'll need to help other countries in the aftermath of the pandemic. We don't want the crisis to return or to take another form.
In Canada and Quebec, we're lucky to have our system. This crisis showed us how fragile our system was and how such a big and strong system could be broken.
Yesterday was International Women's Day. I had a special thought for women. I decided to dedicate this day specifically to the women on the front lines who are serving Canadians and who have been working hard since the start of the pandemic. This unprecedented health and humanitarian crisis has strained the system. These women have felt the pressure of the broken system.
No matter how many times members of the opposition parties hear this, it seems that nothing will change what they've been thinking since this study began. I've realized this. Even though I'm a new committee member, I understood that, no matter what we say, their minds are made up. Their mind was made up even before the start of the committee meetings.
As a new committee member, I had to read the full documents and analyze the information to get up to speed. I can tell you that this unprecedented crisis has opened the door to possibilities. The prorogation had a purpose. However, the opposition used this opportunity to confuse Canadians with regard to the reasons for the prorogation.
Since the opposition members had preconceived notions, the template for the questions was already prepared. I had the chance to read the questions for the various witnesses who appeared. I felt very strongly that the opposition members' minds were already made up. I want to reiterate that the reasons for the prorogation were outlined in the report on this topic. Questions were often twisted around in an attempt to get answers that opposed the prerogative of prorogation.
These are basically the thoughts that drive me and that I want to share with you today.
I'll talk a bit about the report tabled in Parliament regarding the August 2020 prorogation. This document, which consists of 42 pages and includes appendices, already addresses the prorogation that took place last August. We have many other things to worry about.
I'm thinking of some of the questions that you asked certain professors about the technological processes that we're currently using and that we'll be using in the future. I've seen many great things. I'm really excited to come up with new ideas for things such as parliamentary protection and teleworking. I want to address the importance of teleworking and emphasize the difference between work-life balance and teleworking. Work-life balance is about obligations. Teleworking is about accommodation. This distinction is extremely important. I want to have the chance to discuss this matter further in the committee.
I have many ideas for you. As soon as we can put this motion behind us, move forward and prepare a report, we'll be able to roll up our sleeves and work together. This motion doesn't serve any purpose in a time of crisis.
I, for one, did my homework. I don't want to offend anyone. However, some of the points raised lead me to believe that certain committee members only skimmed over the report, without really reading it. The report clearly outlines the reasons for the prorogation that took place in August 2020. The report is clear and well written. I want to take this opportunity to thank all the staff who helped prepare the report and who organized all the questions asked by committee members and the responses provided to the committee since December.
I'll briefly address this report. I want to talk about the report because I think that it shows the irrelevance of the motion before us today. We're always coming back to this motion.
In the introduction to the report, the first page notes that our government changed the Standing Orders to ensure that the current government and future governments remain transparent: “Pursuant to Standing Order 32(7), this report shall set out the reasons for the recent prorogation of Parliament.”
At the outset, I spoke about the report. Our government was the first to table this type of report after a prorogation.
I'll continue reading the report:
In 2015, our government committed to changing the Standing Orders to ensure that ours and future federal governments remain transparent with Canadians in all aspects of governance, including the use of prorogation. This report is intended to provide parliamentarians, and all Canadians, with greater clarity about why our government prorogued Parliament in August 2020.
This is in keeping with our commitment to Canadians.
During the 10 years of Stephen Harper's government, there were prorogations. However, the reasons for the prorogations were never explained. In fact, no Prime Minister has ever publicly explained the reasons for a prorogation. Why are we tabling a report? The goal is to keep people informed and to ensure that we remain transparent.
During previous prorogations, journalists and many other people could make their own assumptions about the reasons for the prorogation. Some people brought up the economic recovery, and other people thought that it was in preparation for a cabinet shuffle, for example. In short, everyone came up with a number of reasons for the prorogation.
It was important for us to set the record straight right after the prorogation and to clearly explain the reasons for the prorogation. That's why our government submitted a report explaining the reasons for the prorogation, period.
The prorogation was done properly. The decided to prorogue Parliament. He submitted the request to the Governor General and she agreed. We then recalled Parliament to set things straight and to work on the next steps in the pandemic.
In the first half of 2020, it became clear that the 2019 Speech from the Throne, when our government won the confidence of the members of the House of Commons, no longer reflected the circumstances in which we were governing. As I said, things change very quickly. In fact, certain things may happen this week that will require us to make adjustments starting next week.
For example, we need to make adjustments each time Health Canada approves a new vaccine, since the storage or use conditions are different from one vaccine to another. There are all kinds of logistics involved in freezing vaccines. When we talk about 500,000 doses of vaccines, we aren't just talking about 500,000 arms to vaccinate. Far from it. We need to coordinate deliveries with the provinces and territories, not to mention preparations for the deliveries. Organizations were evicted from their host community centres so that refrigerators could be set up to store thousands of doses of vaccines. All this has affected the economy, the public, the organizations and the people who will be vaccinated. In addition, each province and territory has its own vaccination system, which complicates the logistics somewhat.
All this shows that our decisions this week may need to be changed or adapted next week. Under these circumstances, clearly the priorities set out in the Speech from the Throne were already different in the wake of the declaration of the COVID-19 pandemic, of course.
This pandemic is not only a global health crisis, it's also a global economic crisis.
The report outlines the challenges faced by the government. The need to help Canadians was paramount, as the following quote shows:
In March alone, Canada's Gross Domestic Product contracted by 7.2 per cent and more than a million jobs were lost. In April, there was a further drop of 11.6 per cent, with 1.99 million jobs lost. Millions of Canadians now faced dire financial straits, in addition to concerns about their health and that of their loved ones.
We set up programs to try to help family caregivers, people who had lost their jobs, businesses, communities and seniors. We helped as many people as we could.
Again, the pandemic is causing these job losses. I don't blame the provinces and territories for having to impose restrictions and create systems of zones—red, yellow and green. However, once an area becomes a red zone, jobs are lost and restaurants are closed. Sugar shacks in Quebec are struggling. Some of them, in my constituency, have managed to continue their activities by offering to deliver their products. Some sugar shacks in my area have even managed to maintain their sales by reinventing themselves. However, some businesses have suffered tremendous losses.
We need to step in and do more for businesses. We must respond and act quickly to help these companies deal with the crisis.
Are these jobs lost forever? Will the labour market return to normal after the pandemic? Will the tourism and food service industries return to their former levels? We hope so.
All the provinces have implemented the tightest restrictions possible to fight the pandemic together. Yet opposition members stand in the House and hold the Canadian government responsible for job losses, even though drastic decisions are being made to fight the pandemic. We're being blamed for job losses and we're being accused of not responding quickly enough. I know that I'm in politics to receive this criticism from the opposition, and I accept it.
However, we now have the chance to show Canadians that the Standing Committee on Procedure and House Affairs has a role to play and that it has everything it needs to make the best possible recommendations on a number of issues that we consider extremely important.
As a new committee member, I sincerely hope that we'll all pull together to continue working. I want to work together. I also want to represent francophones. Although this committee is predominantly anglophone, I want to represent francophones in order to improve the system and move forward. To do so, we must drop this motion, prepare the report and make progress on the many other issues.
In the wake of the job losses, we responded. The prorogation gave us the chance to step back and determine how we could improve the jobs and economic situation. Out of that came the pandemic economic recovery plan. A number of measures will be taken.
Our best move was to help small businesses through CFDCs and BDCs in the regions. For people who are unfamiliar with BDCs and CFDCs, I'll explain their role.
These organizations help companies through grants and support services. They help companies develop business plans, for instance. During the pandemic, the organizations have been supporting SMEs by giving them the opportunity to reinvent themselves. For example, they can help SMEs create websites. These organizations provide the funding needed for companies to keep running and to reinvent themselves. The organizations provide innovation support and help companies purchase modern equipment to increase productivity and create jobs.
In short, CFDCs and BDCs will play a crucial role in the post-pandemic economic recovery.
Our government has ensured that the relevant ministers are working together, despite the pandemic. We have also been working with BDCs and CFDCs to make more funding available to invest in communities and in creating future jobs.
Now we're no longer just talking about creating jobs, but about maintaining jobs. It's all very well and good to innovate and create new jobs. However, what matters is that we keep the jobs that we have. We mustn't lose our services either. In rural areas, closing a small corner store has the same effect as closing a Walmart in downtown Toronto. We value our post offices and all our small businesses that provide personalized service. We want our workers to look forward to opening the doors of their small businesses in the morning in order to serve the public. We want them to feel excited about coming to work.
Again, as the economy recovers, it's difficult to meet the needs of all types of businesses. We know that some businesses won't make it through the crisis and will close. Some businesses were already in a precarious position before the pandemic. This could be the result of supply chain or corporate structure issues, competing businesses moving in nearby, or a shrinking market caused by changing needs or a declining interest in a product.
The government will be there to help small businesses reinvent themselves. That's one of the reasons why Parliament was prorogued. We thought about how we would help small and medium-sized businesses.
We know that major food chains have been hit hard, especially when it comes to the storage of some of the less-consumed products during the pandemic. A large plant in my constituency had to close for a few weeks because the warehouses were already full. This is part of the economic crisis related to the pandemic.
We took swift and concrete action to support health care systems across Canada. On March 11, 2020, the announced $500 million for the provinces and territories to support the health care systems that are so critical and to make testing available. We knew that health care services were precarious and that there was a significant need for equipment. That's why we made this decision on March 11, 2020. The purpose of all this equipment was to fight the virus. The tests and rapid tests that we sent to the provinces and territories gave us the ability to track the progress of the virus.
It's wrong to say that the government has done nothing for health care. Since the start of the pandemic, we've been fully co-operating. We've transferred all the necessary equipment to provincial and territorial health care systems to fight the pandemic.
It's also important to remember that we sent the army and the Red Cross as backup in two Canadian provinces where the health care system was broken. Two provinces, Quebec and Ontario, had alarming statistics. We had to get more involved in the system. We should be proud that our government could provide medical services through the military and its officials. They could provide support in places where the system was broken.
We've implemented a number of programs and measures. There's nothing better than a prorogation to give us time to sit down and think about how we can best deal with the crisis and support all health care systems in Canada. Our measures to help Canadians during this crisis were identified in working meetings or reflection sessions that we held every day. As members of Parliament, we were the eyes and ears of Canadians.
We've listened to all the questions asked in the House of Commons by opposition members. We've also received many emails from members. I've personally met with members from across the province and they've mostly spoken to me about seniors. I showed the same concern for everyone who spoke to me, no matter who they were or where they came from. I opened my door wide to people who came to talk to me about seniors and about how to improve the system, just as I'm used to doing and as I've been taught to do. In my area, the door was open to almost anyone who needed help. Now, as a member of Parliament, my door is always open to suggestions for how to improve the lives of seniors. I've had constructive meetings with members from all parties, including members of the Bloc Québécois. I was open to suggestions.
We worked hard to improve before the second wave arrived. We all knew that a second wave was coming. We knew this based on the statistics at the height of the pandemic.
In some provinces and territories, we were seeing a loss of control, weakened health care systems, a lack of available beds and staff fatigue.
I want to quote a paragraph from page 5 of the report. When I read the paragraph, I thought that it was a key paragraph to share with you. I wasn't yet a committee member at the time of this statement:
Due to this unprecedented national effort, Canadians had effectively flattened the curve by the summer months. But the battle against COVID-19 was and remains far from over. On August 17, the day before prorogation, the Chief Public Health Officer of Canada, Dr. Theresa Tam, noted:
Our efforts indicate that we are keeping COVID-19 spread under manageable control but the virus is still circulating in Canada and we must not let down our guard. The shape of our national epidemic curve over time, including what impact COVID-19 might have this fall, will be influenced by our collective commitment and actions to keep infection rates low.
Despite what Dr. Tam was saying, despite our situation at the time and our semblance of control, something else happened. It's funny, but it happened in August, at the same time as the prorogation. We knew that there would be some respite over the summer, because of the good weather. We knew that there would be gatherings. We knew that there would be no more activities or family parties. We knew that, as members of Parliament, we would receive fewer invitations to celebrations and festivals of all kinds in our constituencies. We knew that these would disappear. However, we didn't have a crystal ball. Then the prorogation of Parliament was announced.
[English]
Is it perfect timing?
[Translation]
In August, Dr. Theresa Tam, Canada's chief public health officer, said that we needed to be careful and to send clear messages to the public because we were between the first and second waves. Nothing was more relevant than Dr. Tam's warnings to show us that we needed to take a step back.
If we had taken that step back at the start, we wouldn't have been able to say that the curve of the first wave was flattening out. Flattening the curve of the first wave may have gotten us through the crisis, but you know very well how Canadian systems work. Our systems are very regulated, especially with respect to vaccine approval. That's a very good thing. At the time, we also knew that the solution—
As I was saying, in 2015, we did not know a pandemic was coming. We did not know we would have to prorogue Parliament. It was the decision of a government that wanted to be transparent with Canadians and report on the reasons for prorogation after the fact.
The pandemic hit, and nothing was more warranted than a report on the reasons for prorogation. I want to reiterate that the government had to get things on the right track and set out its priorities in a new throne speech, in response to the pandemic.
The timing of the prorogation has been the subject of much debate. Was it the right time? Was it too soon or too late? Why didn't the government prorogue Parliament when the pandemic began? Some have said that the government should have prorogued Parliament at the very beginning of the pandemic, without knowing all the implications, without knowing that people would die and without knowing the fate that awaited seniors. This debate is even more timely now because of the variants, the vaccines, and the distribution of vaccines in the provinces and territories.
It would be appropriate to take a step back now as well. Let's imagine the government had prorogued Parliament at the beginning of the pandemic. A huge amount of information was lacking then. All along, our government has said that it would base decisions on science and the advice of professionals. How could scientists and health care professionals have predicted the future—the declaration of a pandemic—if Parliament had been prorogued when the crisis first began? The timing of the prorogation may not have been perfect, but it was appropriate.
In 2019, the government obtained the confidence of the members of Parliament in the House of Commons. During the second half of 2020, it became clear that the 2019 throne speech no longer represented the context in which we would govern. What caused the change? The pandemic, of course.
I repeat, the government did not have a crystal ball when it prepared its 2019 throne speech, which laid out its new policy directions. Then, suddenly, the pandemic struck, so different values and priorities had to guide us, as a government. That is a point I did not raise the last time the committee met, but I remembered it afterwards.
We responded swiftly with tangible support for health care systems across the country. On March 11, 2020, the announced $500 million in funding for the provinces and territories—an important decision to support health care all over the country. Some have claimed that the government did not provide health care support to certain provinces, and yet, no government has ever done as much for health care as this one. We worked closely with public health authorities to support health care systems and get equipment to those who needed it. We provided funding, ventilators and support for long-term care facilities, not to mention sending in the military and the Red Cross to help.
We were there for the provinces and territories. That sets the stage and summarizes the gist of my remarks at our last meeting, bringing me to what I want to say to you today. I want to talk about the supports and programs we introduced to help Canadians during the crisis, because we knew the second wave was coming.
I've been poring through the report since Tuesday, and I'd like to read an excerpt from page 4:
Due to this unprecedented national effort, Canadians had effectively flattened the curve by the summer months. But the battle against COVID-19 was and remains far from over. On August 17, the day before prorogation, the Chief Public Health Officer of Canada, Dr. Theresa Tam, noted:
Our efforts indicate that we are keeping COVID-19 spread under manageable control but the virus is still circulating in Canada and we must not let down our guard. The shape of our national epidemic curve over time, including what impact COVID-19 might have this fall, will be influenced by our collective commitment and actions to keep infection rates low.
That last paragraph is the important part. Why? Because, if Dr. Tam had known then about the variants and their ramifications, or if she had been concerned about anything other than flattening the curve, she would have said so.
Allow me to explain just how quickly the circumstances of the pandemic can change. In July, people got together more because of the warm weather. We all heard about gatherings in our ridings. There was a huge gathering of young people in my riding. People still gathered for weddings. All those events led to outbreaks that sent certain regions back into the red zone.
Nevertheless, no informed decision-making could have prevented that. No matter how much we told people to do all the right things—wash their hands, social distance and avoid gatherings outside their family bubbles—it was inevitable. On the whole, people have followed the guidelines. They have stuck it out during the pandemic. It is only a minority of people who have made it difficult to get the virus under control, given the alarming rate at which it spreads. When one person is infected, all of their contacts are at risk and they can bring the virus back to their households.
I want to take this opportunity to say that we should acknowledge the whole of our medical system. Essential workers were exposed to the virus every single day. They would come home after work and see their families, their children. Then, they would go back to work. All those doing essential work throughout the pandemic are brave people. They put themselves at risk, and some contracted the virus. The pandemic has been hard on all front-line workers, whether it be paramedics, police officers, grocery store employees or pharmacy staff, but they have never given up.
In the House this week, we talked about the supply chain. That includes not only the factory workers, but also the truckers who cross the border into the U.S., travelling all over to get Canadians the supplies they need. Supply shortages were a real possibility during the pandemic, but there was no such crisis. We never ran out of gas or staples like toilet paper. Everyone helped keep supply chains running throughout the pandemic, doing a good job of managing inputs and outputs to ensure adequate supply for Canada.
On page 5 of the report, the government talks about the importance of developing a plan and refocusing its priorities to face the second wave.
Furthermore, despite the success in flattening the curve in some regions of Canada, and our work to prepare for the fall, it was already clear in August that the colder months would bring new and more difficult challenges, for which we needed to prepare. As I explained, summer was ending and winter was on its way. We all know what happened.
Medical experts from across Canada made it clear that the question was not whether there would be a second wave, but how bad it would be.
That's all from the report, further supporting the fact that the government stepped back to take stock to inform its decision-making. After the first wave, people were at the end of their ropes, they were tired, emergency rooms were full, and hospitals had no empty beds. Every hospital had built makeshift areas for patients. I toured two of them when I went for COVID-19 testing. Workers had used plastic to create makeshift isolation areas for people with COVID-19 symptoms.
All the work was done in preparation for providing this care. Preparations had to be made. No one could have ever anticipated the size of the second wave or its impact on the health care system. We had to get ready. No one knew how bad it would be. It was anticipated that some parts of the country would have to return to lockdown. That meant closing borders and posting police officers where zones intersected to check whether folks could cross from one zone to the other.
My riding is mainly home to cottages and vacation properties. Whole neighbourhoods in a number of municipalities were deserted. Folks could not get to their cottages because of the lockdown. Canadians lost their jobs because of lockdowns; businesses were forced to close, including restaurants. The tourism industry was hit hard. Tourists come to my riding to discover and enjoy the majesty of nature. Municipalities rely on tourism. With travel prohibited, tourists stopped coming to the area. It's tough to keep a tourism-based economy rolling without tourists.
We knew that more Canadians would get sick or die. That was the worst part of the whole thing. We knew the second wave would take its course and that a vaccine was not yet available.
Five and a half months into this pandemic—the greatest challenge Canadians have faced since the Second World War—the people of Canada deserved to know that the federal government had a bold and comprehensive plan. There is nothing in the world more important than being able to tell Canadians what the government can and will do to help them through whatever challenge comes next. A pandemic does not come with an instruction manual. The government strives to make the best decisions possible. It also works with the other parties to come through the crisis as a team.
I don't how it could be any clearer than that. I don't know what more justification the opposition members want. I could spend hours more talking about the reasons for the prorogation and the importance of our work.
Now, I will let other members take the floor to continue this important debate. Later, I will explain my position further.
Thank you.
:
My sincere apologies about that.
First and foremost, I want to say hello to all the members and a special welcome to Scott Simms for joining us today.
Scott, we know you have a long history with PROC, and we really appreciate having you with us. I have to say to start off that I'm not as eloquent, perhaps, as Stéphane. I can't seem to talk as long, but I will certainly do my best in order to address this really important motion. I appreciate the comments that Stéphane and Ryan have made over the past while.
I have to say, as well, that I missed a few meetings because of the Board of Internal Economy, and I felt really bad about that, because I missed a part of the debate.
Today I certainly want to continue on the theme that I spoke about last time, which was about how the opinion of the opposition as to why prorogation occurred has already been made up in their minds. I really want to address that.
[Translation]
To give Mr. Therrien a break, I will switch to French. We tend to speak in English, so Mr. Therrien has to listen to the interpreted remarks. We appreciate the work the interpreters do, of course, but it can be tiring to always listen to people speaking in a language that is not your own. For that reason, I will make most of my comments in French. As an Acadian from New Brunswick, I enjoy speaking in my mother tongue.
Turning back to the motion, I want to point out how many hours we have spent debating the motion put forward by our friend and fellow member Ms. Vecchio. Since many people are probably not familiar with the motion currently being debated, I feel the need to bring everyone up to speed. We are still discussing the same motion. It bears rereading for those Canadians following our proceedings.
Ms. Vecchio's motion reads as follows:
That, in respect of the Committee's study of the government's reasons for the prorogation of Parliament in August 2020, the Committee
(a) renew the invitation issued to the Prime Minister to appear before the committee, provided that if he does not agree, within one week of the adoption of this motion, to appear for at least three hours, the Chair shall be instructed to report to the House forthwith a recommendation that this committee be empowered to order his appearance from time to time;
(b) renew the invitations issued to the Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of Finance and the Minister of Diversity and Inclusion and Youth, each to appear separately before the committee, provided that in respect of each of them who does not agree, within one week of the adoption of this motion, to appear for at least 90 minutes each, the Chair shall be instructed to report to the House forthwith a recommendation that this committee be empowered to order her appearance from time to time;
(c) renew the invitations issued to the Honourable Bill Morneau, Katie Telford, Craig Kielburger and Marc Kielburger, each to appear separately before the committee, provided that in respect of each of them who does not agree, within one week of the adoption of this motion, to appear for at least three hours each, a summons do issue for his or her appearance before the Committee at a date and time determined by the Chair but no later than one month following the adoption of this motion;
(d) renew the invitations issued to Farah Perelmuter and Martin Perelmuter, to appear before the committee, provided that if they do not agree, within one week of the adoption of this motion, to appear for at least 90 minutes, a summons do issue for their appearance before the Committee at a date and time determined by the Chair but no later than one month following the adoption of this motion;
(e) issue an order for the production of all memoranda, e-mails, text messages, documents, notes or other records from the Prime Minister's Office and the Privy Council Office, since June 25, 2020, concerning options, plans and preparations for the prorogation of Parliament, including polling and public opinion research used to inform the decision to prorogue Parliament, provided that these documents shall be provided to the clerk of the committee within two weeks of the adoption of this motion;
(f) issue an order for the production of records of all communications between the government and any of WE Charity (or its affiliated organizations), Craig Kielburger, Marc Kielburger, or Speakers' Spotlight, since June 25, 2020, in respect of the prorogation of Parliament, provided that these documents shall be provided to the clerk of the committee within two weeks of the adoption of this motion;
(g) issue orders to WE Charity (including its affiliated organizations), Craig Kielburger, Marc Kielburger and Speakers' Spotlight for the production of all memoranda, e-mails, text messages, documents, notes or other records, since June 25, 2020, concerning the prorogation of Parliament, provided that these documents shall be provided to the clerk of the committee within two weeks of the adoption of this motion; and
(h) all documents provided to the clerk of the committee in respect of paragraphs (e) to (g) shall be published on the committee's website as soon as practical upon receipt, once they are available in both official languages.
That is the motion we have been debating for a few meetings now. The last time I had an opportunity to comment, I mentioned that we had been studying the matter of prorogation for several weeks. We heard from a number of experts and academics on the issue. On top of that, Pablo Rodriguez and public servants appeared before the committee on the reasons that led to the prorogation of Parliament.
I believe my fellow members already made this point, but if a health crisis of this magnitude is not a good enough reason to prorogue Parliament, I am at a loss to understand what is.
I also want to say the opposition had preconceived ideas about the reasons for prorogation. I read a number of comments made by opposition members last time. I have to tell you I was on duty in the House this week to take part in a debate that had been extended, and I was one of the lucky ones who got to participate in the debate that evening. Opposition members once again brought up WE Charity in relation to the reasons that led to the prorogation of Parliament. The opposition members, the Conservative members, in particular, had their minds made up about why the government prorogued Parliament, when in fact, the reasons are the opposite. In 2019, during the last election campaign, I knocked on thousands of doors, and my constituents told me what their priorities were. I often shared my ideas with friends and fellow members. The throne speech delivered in 2019 did indeed reflect the priorities of the government and those of Canadians.
As we all know, things changed completely in 2020. For the first time, we were confronted with a global public health crisis, in addition to a global economic crisis. That was the case, not just in Canada, but also around the world. The priorities of Canadians changed, and the government had to change course. Naturally, certain themes overlapped, but the government had to rethink its priorities and figure out how to better support Canadians.
As I said, the opposition members have already made up their minds. I'd like to quote a few people I quite admire. The first is my friend and the member for . Mr. Schmale was on the Standing Committee on Procedure and House Affairs in 2015, 2016 and 2017, and he is someone I have always held in high regard. Here's what he said:
I do not think it is any secret that the Prime Minister, we all know, decided to prorogue Parliament because of his involvement in the WE Charity scandal. Following the words of the Governor General, there was absolutely nothing in the Prime Minister's address last night on prime time that could not have been announced in any normal press briefing or even here on the floor of the House of Commons. The Prime Minister, of course, as many are saying, pulled the wool over the eyes of our network executives, claiming that it was not partisan politics but an address to the nation on COVID-19. We all know, after the fact, that the address was entirely political, providing further evidence that prorogation was all about distraction.
Once again, the honourable members are telling us that all the witnesses I listed need to come before the committee, but they have already made up their minds. When I read that statement, when I hear the member say that the Prime Minister's address was entirely political and meant as a distraction, I do not agree. The spoke to Canadians every day during the pandemic. This is not about politics.
Constituents in my riding told me that they would tune in every morning at 11:30 to hear what the Prime Minister and our government were doing to help them. I dare say everybody probably did; I know I did. I would be working at my computer and making calls, but I also wanted to hear the daily update because it gave us hope. It wasn't about politics. When I would take my walks in the park, not far from here, people would stop me because they recognized their member of Parliament, and they would thank me for the job we were doing and the support we were providing.
It was not part of the 2019 throne speech, because we didn't know a crisis was coming, but people were truly thankful for the work we did. Was it perfect? No, absolutely not. We didn't have a manual or guidelines on how to manage the crisis. With input and suggestions from all the parties, we were able to introduce solid programs.
Accordingly, when I hear someone call the decision to prorogue Parliament entirely political, I disagree. The throne speech is not about politics. Yes, some of the themes in the 2019 and 2020 throne speeches overlapped, but the 2020 throne speech contained measures specifically tied to the pandemic.
I would also like to quote the member for , who had this to say:
The Prime Minister prorogued the House to avoid scrutiny on his WE scandal. We all know this. The day after prorogation, the government announced these benefits, several of which would need legislation. Instead of spending time over the last month debating and passing these benefits, the Prime Minister shut down Parliament. Now that the CERB has ended and many Canadians are not eligible for EI, the government is playing politics with the well-being of Canadians.
Much has been said about the prorogation of Parliament, as we have all heard, but I think we lost less than two sitting days in the House. Our government took the time to rethink its priorities and set out guidelines to support Canadians throughout the biggest health crisis of our lifetimes.
The last person I'd like to quote is Mr. Bezan, the member for . On October 5, Mr. Bezan said this:
The only reason we had prorogation by the Prime Minister, since the throne speech is so uninspiring, is the WE scandal. It was not about resetting the agenda; it was about trying to do a cover-up and ensuring the opposition parties could not continue to litigate the government about its scandal and the almost billion dollars it was going to hand over to the WE Charity.
Once again, it's a bit much to call the throne speech uninspiring and to say that it was not about resetting the agenda. Let's look at the differences between the 2019 throne speech and the 2020 throne speech. The opposition likes to say that the 2020 throne speech was not about resetting the agenda and that it was essentially more of the same. I carefully read both speeches and compared them. Certainly, some themes overlap, including climate change. Just because we are going through a health crisis does not mean we should stop addressing the climate crisis.
In 2019, our key priorities and areas of focus revolved around the fight against climate change. When I was knocking on people's doors and making calls during the last election campaign, I was shocked by how many seniors were adamant that the government do something about climate change. Even though they had not been familiar with the issue or considered it a priority before, they told me their kids and grandkids had taught them about the importance of climate change. They felt strongly that the government needed to do the right thing and meet its targets. Climate change remained a priority in 2019. We took ambitious action to make sure we met our targets.
Another issue people cared about was greening the economy. We want to be sure we make those investments. If I'm not mistaken, the government talked about implementing a roadmap in its 2019 throne speech.
Strengthening the middle class was also a key issue for people. As a member of Parliament since 2015, I am very proud of the measures we have taken between then and now to support the middle class and Canadians in need. All of those actions have made a real difference in the lives of Canadians, whether it be introducing the Canada child benefit or lowering taxes. We can't just stop strengthening the middle class now. Those efforts have to continue.
Walking the road of reconciliation is an important focus as well. We must continue moving forward as a partner with indigenous peoples to meet our respective goals. That means working together. Indigenous peoples must show us the path to take, and we must work hand in hand to make sure we get there.
Lastly, keeping Canadians safe and healthy remains a top priority. That includes addressing gun violence. Many constituents told us how important it was that the government do something. Coming from a social work background and having worked on the front lines, I saw the devastating impact guns can have. I'm not proud to admit that New Brunswick has the highest rates of domestic violence and murder-suicide in the country. There is a long way to go to make things better, and we will keep up that work.
Another challenge, it seems, is consistent right across the country. Here, in Atlantic Canada, a lot of us have trouble getting a doctor. Our government made a promise to Canadians, who told us they wanted everyone to have access to a family doctor. That, too, is a priority.
It ties in with pharmacare. I know my fellow member Mr. Blaikie is in favour of a universal pharmacare plan, like many of us. That is a priority for Canadians. As health minister, I had the privilege of working on that file. We made progress and we will continue working to make sure all Canadians have access to national pharmacare.
I could, of course, read the 2019 throne speech in full. Instead of going through it page by page, I'll stick to the broad strokes to highlight the differences between the 2019 and 2020 throne speeches. I just talked about the 2019 throne speech, which was prepared prior to the pandemic. It is 2021 now, and like most of you, I have spent the past year almost exclusively in my riding. I had an opportunity to travel to Ottawa once, but here, in New Brunswick—
:
Thank you, Madam Chair.
In response to Mr. Blaikie's comment, I would just point out that I was on the speaking list for a while and I have quite a bit to say. Patience can wear thin sometimes, but I do understand the process can be long. Ms. Duncan also has things she would like to say. We are eager to hear what everyone has to say.
I will circle back to the motion now. To be honest, I think my comments were relevant to the motion because I was talking about the preconceived opinions of the opposition members. I simply expressed my position, which is that the government had valid reasons to seek prorogation. It was useful. The issue is not whether the throne speech was inspiring or not. The issue is whether it demonstrates a rethinking of goals and priorities. I know the committee has to hear what everyone has to say, so I will try to be succinct. We certainly want to make sure everyone has an opportunity to speak.
Briefly, I am going to run through what I consider to be the highlights of the 2020 throne speech, which opened the session of Parliament after prorogation.
Although I think everything in the throne speech is important, the part that's really crucial pertains to how the government will protect Canadians during a potential second wave of the pandemic. The recollection of some may be wanting, but at the time, we were extremely concerned about the second wave. It may not have been quite the same for those of us living in Atlantic Canada, but the second wave took a great toll on many ridings and provinces. Our government wanted to be there for Canadians and for small and medium-sized businesses. We wanted to make sure businesses could remain open.
As I said, the government built its approach around themes, while keeping the focus on helping Canadians through the second wave. As a government, we wanted to make sure the programs and supports were in place to build back better. The idea was not to rebuild by replicating what existed previously; we had suitable programs, but we now know some of them had gaps. Now seems like the right time to review the programs and tailor them more effectively to people's needs, so we can really help people, especially vulnerable Canadians. Not all Canadians enjoy the same privileges. We want to make sure everyone gets their fair share and has an equal opportunity to succeed. That is one of my top priorities, and it's also one of the reasons why I got into politics.
The pandemic has laid bare fundamental inequalities in our society. Owing to those inequalities, certain groups were hit harder by the pandemic than others. I repeat, the government wanted to pay special attention to the needs of those individuals, and see to it that programs and funding were in place to remedy the inequalities.
Furthermore, I was delighted that the throne speech included supports for people experiencing homelessness. Who would have ever thought that, in a small community like Moncton, the cradle of Acadia, people would wind up living on the streets or out of tents? That wasn't the case a decade ago, but we now see a lot of people who are homeless.
The throne speech mentions support for the rapid housing initiative; a number of organizations across the country have really benefited from the program. Under the initiative, the government is investing a billion dollars in housing units, and $500 million is already in the hands of municipalities. The other $500 million is available to organizations that apply for funding. I am happy to say that a program in my neck of the woods was funded through the initiative. We are working very closely with stakeholders to get housing units built for this population.
The throne speech also addresses the creation of national standards for long-term care facilities, an issue my fellow member Mr. Lauzon spoke about at length. According to figures released yesterday, 22,335 Canadians have died from COVID-19. The figure is heartbreaking, because that many human lives have been lost. Aunts, uncles, brothers, sisters and parents—gone. It is a painful reality.
In the early days of the pandemic, I lost my mother; she was in a long-term care facility. I miss her every single day. I even keep her picture next to me. In spite of everything, I am so glad she did not have to live out the pandemic in a long-term care facility; I think not seeing her daughter for a year would have done her in.
As hard as it may, making sure the provinces and territories work together to develop national standards is imperative. Neither the provinces nor the federal government is solely responsible. We must all come together to ensure seniors receive proper care. My mother spent some 10 years in a long-term care facility, so I had plenty of opportunity to see where the failings were. If we can learn one thing from what has happened, it should be this: we must invest what it takes to ensure seniors are properly cared for.
My apologies for becoming emotional. I wasn't planning to bring that up.
We also need to make it easier for women to participate in the workforce. As we all saw, women have suffered tremendously during the pandemic. They tended to be the ones who had to stay home. While not always the case, it was often women doing double duty: working from home while looking after the kids. The statistics show that, because of the pandemic, more women than men will not return to the workforce. Addressing the need for a national child care system is paramount, and I was certainly glad to see it among the government's priorities in the 2020 throne speech.
Moreover, we must acknowledge the supports that were put in place to help individuals cope with the pandemic. I won't list them all, but the government introduced some excellent programs to support individuals and families, such as the Canada recovery benefit, the Canada recovery sickness benefit and the Canada recovery caregiving benefit. The government also made temporary changes to the employment insurance system, provided options to defer mortgage payments, and made supports available to the provinces and territories. Although the programs may not have been perfect, we were able to make adjustments to get Canadians the help they needed. We asked them to stay home to prevent the spread of the virus, so we made sure they had access to supports.
Another issue of real concern, especially in my riding, was the capacity of organizations to help individuals. As I've mentioned a few times, my background is in social work, so I truly understand the important role not-for-profit organizations play as community service providers. When I hear opposition members call the throne speech uninspiring, I feel like asking, “How could it have been more inspiring?” We were there to help people, businesses and all those not-for-profit organizations.
In my New Brunswick riding, people are doing a tremendous job, working tirelessly. Even though they are seldom well-paid, they are really there to help people. They were there during the crisis, and they still are. I am very happy with the programs we put in place to help those organizations. A number of them in my community have really benefited from that extra funding, which meant they could keep their doors open and provide more help to their clients.
I'll give you an example of a small business here, in Moncton. It's called Inspiration Café. In partnership with the Moncton United Way, the owners opened a small café that employed people with intellectual disabilities and mental health problems. They receive on-the-job training. Folks in the community really got behind the business, going there to eat and so forth, but the café had to close because of the pandemic.
The employees still wanted to work; they went through something of a grieving process. In conjunction with the United Way, the business received government support but could not reopen its dining room. Employees and volunteers got together to prepare and deliver meals twice a week for seniors living at home. Seniors knew they would have at least two good meals a week thanks to Inspiration Café.
I was fortunate enough to do a bit of volunteering at the café over the holidays, since many of the volunteers were off to spend time with their families and children. I spent a few hours with volunteers and employees, cooking and delivering meals, and I saw just how grateful the seniors were.
The pandemic-related investments made by our government have made a real difference. I don't think I mentioned it, but the café currently prepares and delivers about 600 meals a week for seniors—a rather impressive accomplishment.
Alternative Residences Alternatives is another organization that received assistance. It provides housing to people dealing with mental illness. The pandemic, of course, meant that the organization had to restrict visits significantly. The funding we made available was used to create spaces where families could visit residents in accordance with physical distancing and public health rules.
When I hear members call the government's throne speech and investments uninspiring, all I have to do is think about those accomplishments to know the opposite is actually true.
In my New Brunswick riding, the Alzheimer Society was able to introduce a new program. The organization had a support centre of sorts for families living with a person with Alzheimer's, and used the financial support it received to provide families with education on COVID-19 and the public health guidelines.
Big Brothers Big Sisters is another organization I really admire. Naturally, in-person meetings could not take place during the pandemic, but thanks to the support our government provided, the organization was able to create digital spaces where youth and their mentors could meet via Facebook and Zoom.
The Boys & Girls Club of Moncton showed tremendous innovation, doing whatever it could to help youth. The organization has a multicultural clientele, which is wonderful. It really wanted to stay connected with young people, so it organized an activity where community leaders were invited to make a meal on camera so young people could cook along with them via Facebook. I had the privilege of taking part, and there were some really fun recipes for kids. Through activities like these, the Boys & Girls Club of Moncton has been able to reach out to young people, many of whom find it hard being separated from their friends and peers during the pandemic. The feeling of isolation is a real problem, so activities like these are helping young people.
I won't be too much longer. I know the clock is ticking, and I want to make sure Dr. Duncan has an opportunity to share her views today.
Ensemble Greater Moncton is one of the organizations that really benefited from the funding our government made available. It used to provide a lot of services to people living with HIV or AIDS, but with all the medical advances in the field in recent years, the organization now does a lot of work with people impacted by drug addiction.
[English]
SIDA/AIDS Moncton, or Ensemble Moncton, was very fortunate that during the pandemic they received some additional funding.
Oftentimes, they provide harm reduction supplies to people who use drugs, but they were not able to have that frontline service because their agency was often closed because of different colourings—they were going into a red zone or orange zone—and their agency is really small. Because of funding that we've been able to provide for them, they've been able to purchase two computerized interactive harm reduction resource dispensers that are available for people with addictions and disorders.
New Brunswick is a pretty cold province and we get a lot of snow, but these machines are outside. They're centrally located in our downtown. They have all of the safe supplies that they need. The temperature is controlled, so even if they want condoms or whatever the case may be, the temperature is not going to affect the security of any of the products that are given. It's really quite something how we've come a long way. As well, because of the pandemic, they've also made sure that there are face masks and hand sanitizer available in the dispensing machine. This was and is all free of charge.
We wanted to make sure that people received the safe supplies that they needed if they were using. The pandemic should not be a barrier to that. Ensemble Moncton has offered tremendous services over the past years to the community. I was really proud to be able to go to see them as they moved forward with the installation of that program because it was just so important.
Finally, I'm going to make one other comment. I could go on and on because I have so many great agencies, as I'm sure most of you have as well. The Multicultural Association of the Greater Moncton Area, which is a settlement agency that receives a lot of people, was overwhelmed during the pandemic with a lot of newcomers who just didn't know what to do.
They were provided with additional funding. At one event that I had just before Christmas, I asked for them to share with me what difference that had made in their lives and the lives of their clients. The director of the multicultural association had just indicated to me that some people had lost their jobs because of the pandemic. Because of the waiting period for the different programs, one particular client needed medication for their diabetes. The funding that we were able to provide to them bridged them.
All that is to say that when I hear folks say that the throne speech and the work that we've done wasn't inspiring and was just the same, I have to challenge that. We are here to help Canadians. We are all here to help Canadians no matter which party we're in. When we work together we come up with better policy. We really do. When we keep politics out of it—I know we're all politicians; that's who we are—I think we can accomplish so much more when we work together.
During the pandemic right now, people don't want us pointing fingers. It's not who's doing what. They just want us to get the job done. I think if that can be our focus, Canadians are going to be well served by that. Having a minority Parliament is a time for that as well. We have to take each other's feedback and move the best policies forward.
I still have an awful lot of other comments that I could make, but I really want to make sure that my friend and colleague, Dr. Duncan, is going to have an opportunity to share her comments. I'll come back. I'm sure we'll perhaps have another round. Dr. Duncan, we missed you for a few weeks when you were away. We're really happy that you're back with us.
I really want to thank the committee for allowing me time to speak and to share a few thoughts on this issue.
[Translation]
Thank you very much.
:
Dear friends, Madam Chair, before I start, I really feel I have to acknowledge that today we come together to remember, pay tribute to and grieve for all those we have lost to COVID-19. We reflect on the sacrifice, the hurt and the suffering, and we offer comfort to doctors, nurses, frontline workers, survivors, families and communities. We promise to learn the lessons.
Thank you to my extraordinary colleagues, Ryan, Stéphane and Ginette, for your speeches.
Ginette, most recently, thank you for your caring. We are all so profoundly sorry for your loss.
To my dear colleagues, my apologies for my absence recently. I have missed you all.
At this time, it's nice to be able to celebrate, so to Peter and his wife, I wish a very happy 40th wedding anniversary. We all need some light, happy anniversary.
When it comes to the motion, I understand the politics of this motion. However, every single day, Canadians are becoming sick with COVID-19, they are being hospitalized and they're dying. Our focus has to be on Canadians. The COVID-19 pandemic remains a public health emergency, an economic crisis, a social crisis and a human rights crisis. There is nothing that is more important than fighting the pandemic, and we are still fighting the pandemic. We have new variants, and even if we suppress the virus in one country but it is allowed to spread to other parts of the world, the variants and perhaps with new mutations can cause new outbreaks, even in countries that seem to have the virus under control. We have all endured a year of tragedy and crisis. COVID-19 is the most challenging crisis we have faced since World War II, and it's not finished, yet we are arguing over politics.
Moreover, as countries and communities continue our fight to contain cases while rolling out vaccines, the global rollout has been far from even and fair. As of mid-February, 130 countries had not received a single dose of vaccine, and just 10 countries had administered 75% of all vaccines. We must remember that we are one human family, we are interdependent and what happens to one person can quickly affect many others. A cluster of pneumonia cases just over a year ago has translated into over 117 million infections and 2.6 million deaths. If we do not ensure vaccine equity, the virus will continue to spread, to mutate and will ultimately prolong the pandemic, our vulnerability, with devastating impacts. The reality is that we are one small planet with one human family. Disease knows no borders, and through the pandemic and beyond, we are truly in this together.
The point is that responding to COVID-19, recovering from the virus and preparing for the future must remain our focus. We all have to learn from the pandemic. We can't forget what we have all been through, and we need to prepare for the future. This includes our work at this very committee. Lessons learned and pandemic preparedness should be a focus of this committee. Each of us knows COVID-19 very personally. It has touched all our lives—doctors, nurses, frontline workers, survivors, family members and communities—and the virus has done so in ways we could not have imagined a year ago.
All of us know families who are grieving loss. We need to acknowledge their pain and be there for them. We must address the grief, loneliness and stress and provide much-needed mental health supports. We need to lift each other up and inspire hope. We need to think of everyone on the health care front line who has been at this for a year. It wasn't a wave. It was sustained and it has been gruelling and hard. I thank the tireless frontline health care workers, and in Etobicoke North, particularly William Osler Health System for their life-saving services.
I also thank the Rexdale Community Health Centre and its partners for their important community care, including providing health services, delivering food and providing computers and internet access.
A friend of mine who is a physician says that each patient who dies leaves a scar on the heart.
We also need to think of all those on the front line who do not have the luxury of Zooming in to work but who provide essential services, from those working in grocery stores to personal support workers, to truck drivers—everyone who worked to keep our community and country going. We owe them so much more than our collective thanks. We must tackle the glaring inequalities of age, disability, gender, income, race and more that have been laid bare by the pandemic.
In Toronto, where I'm from, in August racialized people made up 83% of reported COVID-19 cases while making up half of Toronto's population. They are more likely to live in poverty, poor housing, have precarious work and be victims of discrimination. All of these lead to worse health.
We have all been touched by the pandemic. I think of the mother who not only has to work but also help her young children learn. I think of students preparing for apprenticeships, college and university, or preparing to make their start in the world, and of what they have lost: a loss of contact with friends, a loss of activities, mental stress. One year is a long time.
I think of grandparents in long-term care, scared and alone. Long-term care facilities bore the brunt of wave one, with more than 70% of deaths occurring among those aged over 80, about twice the average of rates of other developed countries. Tragically, it happened again in wave two. I think of the several long-term care residences in our Etobicoke North community.
Deaths among seniors are not just numbers. Our seniors are people we know, people we have listened to. We have heard their life stories, learned from them, laughed with them, sung with them and danced with them. I dread going back to our long-term care, because I know those people, and I wonder who's not going to be there.
I think about the 48th Highlanders veterans at Sunnybrook Hospital for whom we danced. Eight decades ago, they stepped up for our generation and for future generations. Their motto was Dileas Gu Brath. It means “faithful forever”.
We owe all our seniors who have helped build this country safe and dignified care. The greatest tragedy of this pandemic is the lives lost in long-term care homes.
I think of people with disabilities in congregate settings. I think of the homeless. I think of indigenous peoples. I think of the taxi drivers and the truck drivers in the community I serve, who picked up travellers in the spring at the airport only to succumb to COVID-19.
The point is that it's our families and communities that should be top of mind now: protecting their health and safety, their jobs and their livelihoods. Think of the thousands who work here in the parliamentary precinct. Think of our clerks and the teams that support this very meeting. These are our colleagues, our friends who work to maintain the people's House. What lessons do they want us to learn? What lessons do they want carried forward for the next pandemic, disaster or for next time?
What Canadians needed this past year, what they need a year into the pandemic, is to know how best to protect themselves, their families and communities. They need economic support.
I strongly believe that our focus has to be on protecting the health and safety of Canadians, protecting jobs and livelihoods and the economic recovery, and not on scoring partisan political points.
In order to protect the health and safety of Canadians we closed the borders. We directly funded the provinces and territories. We bought personal protective equipment and testing kits, and we pre-ordered vaccines.
The most important thing we can do to address the spread of COVID-19 is to vaccinate, test, contact trace and isolate.
Our government bought the vaccines and tests and provided contact tracers and quarantine hotels. In the spring, when the women and men of the Canadian Armed Forces were needed, they went in to care for our elders, for our families.
To protect jobs and livelihoods, the government put in place strong measures to protect businesses and workers. We had to do this because the virus could only be slowed or stopped by limiting social contacts. This meant reducing economic activity. It meant shutting down workplaces and later limiting the number of people restaurants served. It meant asking people to stay home from work if they were sick or their children were sick. It simply would have been unfair to ask businesses to shut down and workers to stay home without compensating them for lost income.
The reality is that the best economic approach is to stop the spread of the disease. The next best approach is to help Canadian businesses and Canadian families weather the pandemic without losing their livelihoods and without going broke.
We must provide meaningful investment to build our way out and to ensure our economy comes back stronger than before, laying a foundation for a green economy, an innovation economy and a fair economy that supports good jobs for all Canadians.
To rebuild from job losses and strengthen our economy, we will launch a campaign to create more than a million jobs. Families should not have to choose between their health and their jobs, and our families should not have to take on the debt that their government can better shoulder.
Pandemics are not the time for partisan politics. It's time for the country to come together to protect one another and to begin to heal, but we have to acknowledge the hurt first and there are a lot of people who are hurting.
We call daily into our Etobicoke North community to hear how people are doing. Our Etobicoke North families matter. They are good people. They work hard. What makes Etobicoke North such a special place to live, work and play is that we welcome the world. We are proudly one of the most diverse communities in the country. We learn from one another, and we learn each other's beautiful cultures, languages and religions. We look after one another, and we lift each other up.
We ask how our families are doing and what is on their minds, and the answers are invariably the same: protecting their health and safety, jobs and economic livelihoods.
My friends, we have done good work together in this committee in putting in place virtual voting and coming together to produce a report on the best way to protect Canadians and democracy should an election happen during the pandemic, but there is more good work to be done, important work.
Will we clearly remain in the throes of responding to the pandemic? Our focus must absolutely be the response.
It will also be important for this committee to review the parliamentary precinct response. Was there a pandemic plan? Who was consulted in the development of any pandemic plan? How often was any plan reviewed? Once it was known that something new was circulating in late 2019, on what date was any pandemic plan first looked at? Was any plan updated in January and February? What actions were taken during January and February to protect the health and safety of all those who work on Parliament Hill?
Was there any consultation with Canada's chief public health officer in December, January or February? Was there any consultation with Canada's chief scientists? Was there a review of Parliament's response following the 2009 H1N1 pandemic? When was any plan updated following H1N1? Was a tabletop exercise ever run for Parliament following the H1N1 pandemic?
Did each of the major groups in Parliament know about any plan for security, pages, those who provide food and more?
:
Thanks, Ms. Vecchio, for your proposal.
[Translation]
However, we really are ready to debate as long as we need to do so.
Earlier, you talked about respect. No self-respecting government would allow a motion like that to be passed. Whether it's a majority or minority government, the was still elected by universal suffrage and is the people's choice. It is not true that we must pass this motion, which is purely partisan and whose purpose was already predetermined before we even discussed it and made recommendations on the proposal. It is very unfortunate.
As parliamentarians, we should be focusing on matters that Canadians really see as important. We are still in the middle of the pandemic. We know what happened. The current situation happened because of the break week. Two weeks later, the virus resurfaced and there have been more cases of concern. We are still in the second wave and we are heading towards the third. Do we not have to concentrate on something completely different today?
Our committee can make a difference, not on health or public health recommendations, but certainly on everything related to procedure. Today, I see no use for us in still being here, possibly for a long time. We are ready to face up to what is happening and we would like to focus on much more important matters, as we should.
This week, we made more than 1,240 calls to people in my constituency. Not one talked to me about prorogation, let alone that it was caused by the WE Charity affair. In fact, people were talking about what is happening today and what they need. They were concerned about the election and wondering how it would unfold, should there be one. That is about procedure. Canadians, including the Quebeckers in my constituency, are focusing on the millions of doses that we have delivered to them this week. The concern is knowing how they will be administered and how we can assist our governments in administering them.
Canadians are wondering about the economic recovery that will shortly be getting under way. We can ask ourselves the same questions, in order for the economy to recover properly. This is one of the biggest crises for generations, since the wars, in fact. Canadians are not focused on the partisan games being played in Parliament. They have no idea about what we're doing, right at this moment. Our entire focus should be on moving our issues forward so that the government moves forward too.
We have made some wonderful announcements. We are trying to work for the people and their constituencies, especially on Internet access. This week, the Premier of Quebec and Prime Minister Trudeau announced that thousands more Quebec households would be connected to high-speed Internet by September 2022. This is a partnership with the province that moves things forward, and that is what people are talking to us about.
They are talking about procedures, about innovation, about working at home, about the work-life balance, and about telework. At this very moment, 40% of my constituents have no Internet access. They are not even able to listen to us right now, or to see what is happening in the House of Commons, because they have no Internet.
It is essential for my constituents to talk about important matters like the economic recovery. We have such major, hot-button issues to deal with. For example, we want to talk about climate change, about the economic recovery, about the energy transition, and about investments.
The convention that took place at the end of last week has shown us that 55% of the hardline Conservatives do not acknowledge that climate change exists. But it is the reality and we must face up to it. That is what our constituents are talking to us about. We have to move forward on issues like these. Electrifying transportation, public transit, green innovation and access to high-speed Internet are the issues of today. This is about helping all our communities, not just mine, but yours too.
Canadians would like us to be debating other issues, not trying to associate the prorogation with a nonexistent scandal over the WE Charity. The opposition is trying to make it into a scandal, but after everything that has gone on in the other committees, we have seen no impact. So we all know that the real object of prorogation was the need to reset the government's agenda.
Let us be clear: as I said earlier, this motion is a trick, an illusion. Could it simply be a way to keep the WE Charity scandal story alive?
A number of other parliamentary committees have examined the documents and the testimonies in detail and found nothing at all that could show that anything inappropriate was done. The drafted a report on the prorogation and explained the problems that occurred in connection with the student grants.
Instead of all this, we could be focusing on matters that really concern Canadians. We have a lot of them to study at the Standing Committee on Procedure and House Affairs. The committee has produced a report that I work with every day and that deals with possible future business. It's a fine work plan. Personally, I like working with work plans. But they are supposed to provide us with direction. Are we providing ourselves with good direction by doing what we are doing today? I don't think so. I don't think that we are being useful. We should move on.
However the motion is amended, I am convinced that it is unreasonable to summon the Prime Minister in this case. We have met with witnesses and they have shown us clearly that the Prime Minister had a good reason to prorogue Parliament, the pandemic. It was a good way to react to it. If a pandemic is not a good reason to prorogue Parliament, I don't know what one might be.
So there is the real problem: the opposition cannot handle the fact that, since last summer, they have spent all their time, all their energy, and all their resources trying to fabricate this nonexistent crisis. The crisis was invented to try and create conflict and to implicate a government that is trying to make the best decisions possible to help as many people as possible during a pandemic, including those who live in your constituencies. They are our constituents, our companies, our workers and our students.
Sometimes, when we work quickly, we can make mistakes.
Let us not forget that we in all parties worked together on measures and found solutions. We wanted workers coming to one constituency not to be penalized and forced to go into quarantine before being able to work. We did not want to make it necessary to isolate, house and feed them for that time. We found ways to make it happen.
In all the decisions we made, we missed the fact that travellers coming back from holiday in the South could be paid during their quarantine. We had to take a step backwards, admit it and work together to make the correction. When we move fast, when we make decisions quickly, and when we are in the middle of a crisis, we may make mistakes. That's what the told us.
We could see the frustration on some faces after the Prime Minister, his Chief of Staff and his ministers came before committees and all said the same thing. In theory, the Canada Emergency Student Benefit was a good program that had a place. Our intentions for it were good. Unfortunately, we failed when we were putting it into operation. Nothing is perfect. Our government was in the middle of a global pandemic.
The important point I want to emphasize is that we work with public servants. Let me take this opportunity to thank them and to say “well done”. I congratulate them for supporting the government, when such support is so difficult in times like these. Think about the technological shift that public servants are experiencing at the moment. Think of all the rules that have to quickly change and of all the decisions that we are making. Each of those decisions has an impact on the financial system. Software is not even designed to handle this pressure on the system. We are making miracles happen, thanks to the work of the public servants who are trying to represent us as best they can. We must take this opportunity to say that, while public servants may work in the shadows, they are just as important as front-line workers.
Officials and politicians have worked countless hours to make sure that all the programs we have created are available to help Canadians in difficulty. Of course, mistakes were made, but far be it from me to point fingers at anyone. It's easy not to make mistakes; you just do nothing.
When you get into politics, it is because you are looking for the big picture. My father always told me that, if I did not try, I would not learn, but if I did try, I could make mistakes. I am not perfect either. I am perhaps not as educated as a number of you, but I can tell you that, when I have work to do, I always try to do it in the interests of Canadians as much as I can, to make the best decisions I can, to get as much information as I can, so that we can keep our promises and be as fair we can. On the day after an election, I turn the page. You may support the Bloc, the Conservatives, the New Democrats or the Liberals, but if you come with a request in my constituency, I will turn myself into a public servant in order to respond to it.
That is how public servants work, they work in a nonpartisan manner. They are there for us, so that we can move forward. I use them as my example in serving the public. In addition, I am Deb Schulte's parliamentary secretary. She and I have the same approach: let's help everyone. Never have so many multiparty consultations been held as for the New Horizons program. Now we are assured of fairness through all Canadian constituencies. We are here to work for all Canadians, to work together.
A pandemic is never good. However, there is nothing better than a situation like this to show Canadians that we can and we must move forward together.
The public service has served the government from day one. It dates from Confederation, 152 years ago. In the First World War, about 100 years ago, jobs at the Post Office and in Customs were given to people who had voted for the party in power. Today, the public service is nonpartisan. We have had the same model for 100 years and we must keep it.
Whatever the elected government, whoever the current Prime Minister, everyone have been able to count on the support of a neutral, nonpartisan, professional and merit-based public service. Public servants in Canada are there to serve the public. They are there to advise the men and women who have been elected to make decisions in Cabinet and in Parliament. It may also be that the same has happened to them as it did to us, and they have made errors, because having to make decisions creates a lot of pressure.
Once again, let me remind you that our officials did the best they could in the WE Charity affair. The Prime Minister's office had no bad intentions. It just moved too fast.
The biggest machine in Canada is the government. We are lucky in having a public service that is able to move from one government to another in the blink of an eye. They are able to adapt in a few days. However, to do so, they have to adapt themselves, adapt procedures, add regulations. They have to work with new regulations, with new members of Parliament who have new ideas. Freshly elected members of Parliament arrive with their heads full of ideas, with the wind in their sails, and with the desire to make change. In addition, each time Parliament changes, the procedures and the rules of the House have to be improved.
On my first day in the House, I remember being surprised by the voting system. I could not imagine that, for the rest of my political career, everyone was going to have to stand up in turn to say “yea” or “nay”, to spend an hour on each vote, and even to do so during the night. I told myself that we should be able to improve that process.
We have recently been able to move to our first electronic votes. We know that it was the result of a tremendous amount of work done in the shadows by our public servants. We know that procedures were added over time that allow us to experience what we are experiencing today. My hat is off to our officials.
In the middle of the first wave of the pandemic, we were working like crazy. Something was bound to happen sooner or later and it happened when decisions were being made and when we were wondering whether we had responded to everyone. We tried to do so and we tripped over some grey areas. We found some exceptional cases to which we were not able to respond.
Are we going to be able save all our companies? I am not sure.
Will our economic recovery be perfect? Will people quickly regain the jobs back that they lost?
Let us not forget that we already had a labour shortage before the pandemic.
Will the economic recovery and the rehiring reveal the fact that some areas, such as culture and tourism, will be more affected, given that people have relocated to other sectors?
These are questions that we must ask ourselves during the pandemic. At the end of last fall, after hearing countless hours of testimony, after examining thousands of pages of documents and the detailed evidence in those documents, the opposition recognized that it had overplayed its hand. This was the case in all the committees, I should mention.
What we are doing here is more or less repeating the failure in other committees. As I see it, it is important today for us to follow the example of what happened in the other committees, and to move on.
However, here we still are. We are still dealing with another motion before the committee, a motion that is clearly fixated on the WE issue, which is unrelated to, and has nothing to do with, the pandemic or the prorogation. However, it masquerades as an examination of the prorogation in August 2020. What they are trying to do is so clear that it borders on the surreal. This is not the example I want to provide to our young politicians of the future.
I hope that no university political science prof will use this kind of motion as an example of doing politics. The lesson that absolutely has to be learned, as various witnesses before this committee have told us, is that all our constitutional conventions give the the authority to advise the Governor General on prorogation. The Prime Minister just has to go to the Governor General to ask for permission to prorogue Parliament.
Basically, you just have to respect that. Basically, you just have to get it into your head that we have a Prime Minister who was elected by universal suffrage, whether you like it or not, whether you like him or not. Our Prime Minister is still Canada's highest elected official.
The decision to go to the Governor General to ask her for permission to prorogue Parliament was his alone. As a consequence, we should not even be talking about it anymore. Now, he decided to go further. He decided to do more. He decided to tell Canadians why he made that decision, something that no Canadian Prime Minister has ever done. He decided to justify the prorogation.
Some witnesses used the prorogation to say that he acted too soon; some said that he acted too late. We could see that some witnesses did not have a clear picture of what was going on in our constituencies during the pandemic. Let us not forget to mention our seniors and what they went through in the long-term care homes. At a time like that, while the Canadian Army and the Canadian Red Cross were coming to assist in long-term care homes in the provinces of Ontario and Quebec, witnesses were telling us that it was not necessary to prorogue Parliament during the pandemic.
If you are telling me that that was not a preconceived idea, I do not understand politics at all anymore.
So, for all those reasons, the Prime Minister has the full authority to declare a prorogation and to restart our government. We have also learned that the Prime Minister does not need a reason to do so. We have heard witnesses saying “this is the reason” or “this is why we should prorogue” or “these are the reasons that have been used for prorogation in the past”. No reasons are needed. Prorogation is the prerogative of the Prime Minister, as authorized by the Governor General.
Throughout this country's history, prorogation has been used to start again from scratch. It is a reset, as it were, for the government, for the business of Parliament. The time between the dissolutions and the throne speeches has varied from a few hours to a number of weeks. Witnesses have told us that it could have been done in 24 hours. Work is needed behind the scenes. Who does that work? As I told you before, our public servants do it.
When you work too quickly, you can make mistakes. Today, I can tell you that the Speech from the Throne was well prepared. There was a lot in it and I found it very interesting. The opposition points to the time that elapsed between the prorogation and the Speech from the Throne in September to claim that it is linked to the WE Charity. Almost no time was lost in the House. Let us not forget that, in the fall of 2008, the former Conservative prime minister prorogued Parliament for weeks before coming back to the House.
I find it ironic that this is happening today. Given that this Prime Minister is not Conservative, the Conservatives now support a motion like this, just to stir things up or to create a crisis that does not exist. I also find it very ironic that some of the members sitting here today were part of that government. We cannot say that other members of Parliament were involved, because some of the ones here were there at that time.
Prorogation is an inherently political action, based on political considerations. There is nothing bad, nothing inappropriate in that. When I say that public servants are involved, I mean that they focus on the announcements that will be made in the Speech from the Throne. However, before the Speech from the Throne, came the purely political prorogation, the Prime Minister's prerogative.
Prorogation is an action. Why does one prorogue, why is it political and why is it acceptable? Those are questions we were asked during the testimony. It is because the government's program is political, which is why we became involved in politics. It is so that we can live every day to its fullest, bringing about change to benefit the citizens of our country.
When we make political choices like that, it's so that we can offer those citizens the choices in a better way. My opposition colleagues must make the distinction between a political action and a partisan action. The government was elected on the basis of its political program. Once again, whether you like it or not, we have implemented a program. Those elected in Canada are sticking with that program, such as the fight against climate change. Our citizens have chosen to put their trust in this government.
The government was elected on the basis of its program, but the Speech from the Throne is a political manifesto, establishing the government's roadmap that matches the program. Consequently, the need to prorogue Parliament and to update the program is purely political and perfectly acceptable. That is the nature of prorogation. To say that prorogation took place for reasons other than the pandemic, just means that we end up here today before a dysfunctional committee.
I understand full well that Ms. Vecchio has proposed amendments to the motion with a view to improving it. We know full well that, under such conditions, there is no real justification for the to be at the committee. We already know how and why the prorogation happened.
We are here today because we were obliged to prorogue Parliament and restart the government. In December 2019, the government presented a Speech from the Throne based on its political promises and the objectives it had set for itself in the goal of moving, Canada forward. However, no one could have foreseen the global pandemic that occurred in March 2020.
As parliamentary secretary to the Minister of Seniors, I became involved in increasing the old age security pension by 10%. We made that commitment when we were hit by the pandemic. We did not just increase the pension by 10%, we gave seniors twice as much money in various ways. We helped seniors by providing a one-time GST tax credit. During the pandemic, we gave low-income senior couples more than $1,500. Who could have foreseen that we were going to give seniors double the money that was intended during the first election campaign, in the space of a few days, in the blink of an eye?
My daughter reminded me of something this week. She told me that, on the same date last year, she was at a friend's house and that I called to tell her that I was coming to get her. She was not allowed to be with her friends anymore because a new rule had come into effect. My daughter did not understand why she had to leave her friends and no longer have any contact with them. No one could have foreseen that. A year later, she still cannot see her friends, except those who are in her class. Her school has major restrictions in terms of contacts. Who could have foreseen that? Because of the pandemic, my daughter could no longer see her friends. If a pandemic is not a good reason to prorogue Parliament, I don't know what it would take. We prorogued Parliament so that the government could make the right decisions.
This affects our families and it affects seniors. Seniors have suffered because of the isolation and they have suffered financially. Seniors who live in long-term care facilities have seen their neighbours die because of the pandemic. Front-line workers assisting our seniors have fallen in action trying to sustain the healthcare system. Those are all good reasons to prorogue Parliament and restart the government.
I am led to wonder whether we really are working in good faith, really working on specific ideas in the purview of committees on procedure. Once again, we have an attempt to link prorogation to the WE Charity to try to draw the media's attention to a crisis that does not exist. Everyone knows that mistakes were made with WE Charity, but it's over. Let's start the clock again and move on.
Once again, I need to thank all the public servants who have tried, through grant programs, to find the best possible ways of helping all the students whose jobs in tourism have been affected. In my constituency, a lot of young people work in tourism and agriculture during the summer. We have been badly affected at home. I have seen it in my constituency and you in yours. The entire program introduced in Parliament in December 2019 suddenly became obsolete, because we had been hit hard. All the priorities, the good intentions, the parliamentary sessions and the committee meetings are taking a different form because of the pandemic. There are so many things that we can do to improve things for people.
As a principle, we should be talking about the great projects that we had on our agenda. I am thinking of things like reviewing regulations. Even today, I dream of reviewing regulations so that I can add my two cents. I would like to have been with you from the beginning. I came to the committee late. For a few weeks, though a new, legitimate member of the Standing Committee on Procedure and House Affairs, I was like a guest. But I can assure you that, once I am in a boat, I can row and I can work with others. I would like to have made a number of points because the preamble says that members of Parliament can make suggestions for projects to be debated at the Standing Committee on Procedure and House Affairs. There have been some good ideas.
I was talking earlier about the public service. But let us not overlook the interpretation services with which we are provided. The interpreters do a remarkable job. They keep us going through our long hours of work in both official languages. We often do not take the time to thank them or appreciate their work. We have an agenda item to study the interpretation services, to look for ways of improving their situation so that we can be better served in both official languages. If you can hear me in your language, in English, it is because we have exceptional services that make it possible and that our procedures provide for.
I was one of the founders of the rural caucus in 2015. Even today, the problem continues when elections come around. This is a matter I raised in 2015 and in 2019. In remote regions, some people travel 200 kilometres to get to a polling station in order to exercise their right to vote. With today's technology, with high security and with cyber security, would it be possible for our procedures to provide for ways of improving remote voting? We might, for example, call the topic “Rural and Remote Voting” or “Voting in Rural and Remote Areas”.
It would mean that the elderly would not have to depend on others else to drive them 200 km to vote and that we would be able to provide a more up-to-date service. These are matters that I would like to discuss at the committee. But I feel really useless.
So I will talk for as long as it takes, for three weeks if I have to, to point out that, for this motion, we should simply write a report, continue to work together, roll up our sleeves and move forward.
Believe me, it is not a good idea to summon the Prime Minister to a committee when everything has been said, when a report has been prepared, when we have admitted the problems with the WE Charity and also when another report was written as a result of the prorogation.
In addition, we have met with witnesses today and we are capable of understanding the issue. Really, we should be moving on.
Earlier, I talked about reviewing regulations. Just in terms of the review of the Canada Elections Act, a lot of work was done. My hat is off to you. A lot of work was done by this committee and by other committees. However, so many things are evolving so quickly because of the current situation that we have to constantly be aware of and open to changes. It is a role that our committee must take seriously so that we can play our rightful part as agents of change. The committees are the best places to produce reports along those lines.
I would also like to talk to you about an extremely important matter, which is to examine initiatives to improve the work-family balance in the House of Commons. This is a matter that we must focus on and to which I would like to suggest a refinement. In fact, not only are we talking about the work-family balance today but we have more women and more young people in politics. The young people have children and we all know the sacrifice made to be in politics when one has children. Can we do better?
Personally, I would like to establish a link between telework and the work-family balance. I would really like to discuss this issue with you and work to do a study, or to improve a study, along those lines. Nothing is more current. I feel that this matter should be moved to the top of the list. As a government, we would also be able to ensure a good transition.
No one is talking about this, but, currently, a number of public servants working remotely do not even know the difference between telework that the employer imposes, that is to say working from home because one cannot go back to the office, and choosing to balance work and family. In fact, the work-family balance allows a family to improve its quality of life when one of the two parents can work at home. It means that someone is there to greet the children when they come home from school; it means that people are no longer sitting in traffic for hours. That is possible, but only when the work done at home is equally effective.
I could talk to you about this for a very long time. I have read a lot on the matter. I have my opinions.
We absolutely have to work on the work-family balance issue, but we must also include the aspect of telework, because it is being imposed on workers. If people want to be paid, they have to work outside their offices, in other words, to telework. They are given the equipment they need to set up at home, but with no concern as to the isolation they might feel or the space they need. Some people are alone from morning to night because their socialization is done at the office. Their work is their family. They can't see their friends in the evening and, during the day, they are alone in their little apartments. We see this mostly in large centres, where public servants rent apartments closer to their offices during their first years of work. Let's put ourselves in the shoes of people living alone in small apartments for more than a year and who have set up their kitchen tables as Service Canada offices in order to work. It is extremely difficult.
These are the kinds of matters I would like to be talking about at meetings of the Standing Committee on Procedure and House Affairs. Let's also not forget the legal structure of the Parliamentary Protective Service. I've already talked about that a little, so I will not go back over it.
Everything happens quickly today. I am thinking of the news and the allegations we can see online. Everything that happens today becomes a pressing issue. You can even include recommendations on the study on issues of sexual harassment. That is a pressing issue. We also have the issue of medical assistance in dying for the healthy. Why do we not focus on those matters, even though they may not be easy to talk about?
We have to talk about the measures that must be taken against any form of harassment. We have to talk about the legal structure of the Parliamentary Protective Service. They are matters of great consequence, but we have to brave the storm and move forward. It makes no sense to be talking about prorogation and its links to an imagined scandal involving WE Charity, given all the work we have to do at the moment.
In addition, we know that our committee has to conduct a study on redrawing constituencies. It is our responsibility to do so. We have to start sooner rather than later, because the demographics are constantly changing. For example, in my constituency, some regions are developing exponentially. Since the pandemic started, there has been an explosion of people into remote areas. Cottages have become so important. Some are converting them into houses. The real estate market varies enormously. The Canadian market is overheated everywhere right now.
By all indications, the demographics are changing rapidly in each of our constituencies. The game-changing news is that high-speed Internet is going to be accessible. Some municipalities in my constituency were not developing because they had no Internet access. The provinces and the federal government have committed to ensuring that everyone has Internet access. With the minister responsible, they have established a number of programs. The CRTC has also created a program. My province had a program and the federal level had a program. So a project jointly funded by Quebec and the feds has just been announced. Just imagine the demographic explosion that this is going to create in rural areas and in the regions.
We have the data today. The data are probably realistic. We can use the data we have today as a basis; we can work with the Standing Committee on Procedure and House Affairs and assess the increase in the number of rural residents. The increase will result in some overload. In downtown Toronto, with block upon block that are 95% apartment buildings, nothing will change. We know that not a lot will change. However, we have to ask ourselves whether we need more constituencies, whether we need to increase the number of residents per constituency, and whether our constituencies need to be made bigger.
My constituency currently has 41 municipalities, spread over 5,000 km². That is a lot of ground to cover. When I go to the far end of my constituency for a dinner or an evening, I have to stay there overnight and come back the next day. You can see clearly how those things have to be thought through. The Standing Committee on Procedure and House Affairs has to take a look, in order to change and improve the way we do things.
I would now like to discuss something other than constituency boundaries. It deals with recommendations about a study on a confidence convention. This matter was raised by a member, in fact. He wants to establish a confidence convention.
Reading that piqued my curiosity. I went to check what studying a confidence convention might entail. I couldn't find anything about it. I am ready to listen to others, to take the plunge and to learn. I am curious to move forward and to find out what is possible in terms of a confidence convention.
To me, it is not common political language, and I have been working in politics since 2009. I am open to it today. However, we are going to have to work as a committee, ask questions and plan for a working session on the approach to the upcoming motions we want to implement. We have to know what work we want to do.
Earlier, the Chair said that we have to pass a budget. We have to bite the bullet and pass a budget. Even though members are not travelling, there are still expenses for the technical equipment for our guests. The committee wants to hear the witnesses' testimony. That actually seems to be the greatest expense. Even though we are not travelling and the committee has no expenses, we still have to establish a budget and set priorities. So we are going to have to make decisions along those lines.
Basically, all the plans, priorities and intentions that we had for the parliamentary session at the beginning of 2020 have disappeared and been replaced by the urgent need to assist Canadians to make it through the greatest global event since the Second World War. It is therefore quite logical that, when the first wave subsided, in the summer of 2020, the government had to take stock and decide whether it was still possible to continue with the plan that had been established in December 2019. That was done in preparation for the Speech from the Throne.
No one here can argue the fact that it was necessary to reset the government's priorities after the first wave of COVID-19.
We had to concentrate on the economic recovery, on seeking vaccines, on the importance of working well with the provinces to prepare to vaccinate Canadians, and on the preparations for the likely second and third waves. It was exactly the kind of situation where prorogation was needed and was properly used.
Some have said that it was a political decision by the . As I said previously, it is perfectly understandable that the reasoning should still be the subject of debate. However, the committee was able to be made aware of the government's reasoning, and that is the important point. We on the committee expect to hear the explanations so that we can accept the answers. The Prime Minister himself took the time to justify the prorogation. In addition, Mr. Rodriguez came before the committee and explained the government's position. It was absolutely unnecessary for the Prime Minister or his Chief of Staff to appear.
Let us not mince words. Some of Ms. Vecchio's amendments would mean that the Prime Minister would have to appear with his Chief of Staff. We know that is pure politics. It is absolutely unnecessary for the Prime Minister to appear. Frankly, I wonder why we are back at this stage, given everything I have just explained.
In closing, I will spend a few minutes on that issue.
[English]
I will end on this, but this is very important.
[Translation]
Honestly, why would we be asking for those witnesses to appear here given that, in the court of Conservative and opposition opinion, they are already guilty of something? We can read as much in the questions and the answers: they are guilty before ever they come here. Notions have been preconceived. We have a motion to knock somebody down who is already on the ground. At this committee, the opposition has presumed the conclusion of the matter and has done everything it can to try and make the facts fit its story. What facts is it talking about? There are no facts, because those witnesses appeared at other committees. With what result? None.
Canadians are not interested in this political game. They are concerned by the political game being played by the Conservatives and their opposition cronies. Canadians do not believe in this fake crisis they are trying to create. The scope of the motion before us is so broad, and so inappropriate for this study that, as committee members, we have no other choice but to reject it. If you want, we can talk about a counterproposal or an amendment to the motion later, but I will be speaking for my point of view as long as it is necessary to do so.
I find it interesting to be talking to you about the way in which I do politics and the decisions we made in terms of the prorogation. As I reread the motion we are discussing today, I found it interesting to see how outrageous the opposition's attempt really is.
They are not trying to do a study on prorogation; this is about the WE Charity. Prorogation is only an excuse for them to bring that matter up before the Standing Committee on Procedure and House Affairs. I understand my opposition colleagues' frustration. For months, they have been trying to make this an issue, at a number of committees and in the media, and they have got nowhere. Now, they are trying one last time to use the WE Charity to embarrass the government. I understand their frustration.
During the pandemic, we helped seniors, especially the most vulnerable. To start with, we gave them a GST credit, which helped 6 million seniors in Canada. The Bloc Québécois has said publicly that we did not help seniors because the GST credit was made available to everyone, not just seniors. For us, “everyone” includes seniors. For me, all Canadian citizens have a place in the country that I am proud to defend.
Furthermore, the dates for which documents have been demanded, show that our colleagues are not interested in prorogation itself and they are actually trying to link the WE Charity to this study. When I arrived, I began to take notes, in order to trace the history of the study. Today, with a simple and concise analysis, it is easy to see the opposition's intention in introducing such a motion. These demands for witnesses and for documents are simply intended to slow down the work of the government, rather than to work in the interests of Canadians. We can see what is happening in the House in terms of medical assistance in dying. They don't want to move matters forward; they just want to hinder the work that the government is doing.
It is really funny to hear the Leader of the Opposition say that he wants the government to succeed in providing vaccines to Canadians. That is a joke. When we succeed, he's happy, and when the distribution is not going quick enough for his taste, he blames us. He would like us to move faster than the public health authorities and to be able to—
:
Thank you so much, Madam Chair.
Actually, yes, I was on the committee back then. Quite interestingly enough, the Province of New Brunswick right now is looking at studying a family-friendly type of legislature in New Brunswick. As Mr. Lauzon has indicated, we have an awful lot of young parliamentarians and, as such, they're wanting to look at things differently. It's good.
Before I begin, I wanted to say a special hello to Richard Cannings, the member of the NDP.
Thank you for joining us today, Mr. Cannings. I always have great memories of my first day in Ottawa. I met you and your wife in 2015 in our orientation session, and I think you and I both didn't exactly know what we were getting ourselves into. It's great to see you, and thank you for joining us. It's always great.
I have to also say, Monsieur Lauzon, thank you so much for all of your comments. I have to laugh when you say you're new to PROC and that you really want to make sure you're carrying your weight.
[Translation]
You are carrying your weight, no doubt about it.
[English]
You're continuing to work. I have to say you're certainly contributing a lot to the committee, Stéphane, and we appreciate your wisdom and your experience. Thank you so much for all that you do for us.
[Translation]
Before I start, I have to be honest. My comments are somewhat related to what Mr. Lauzon said earlier.
We are talking about the whole question of the relevance of prorogation. We are continuing this study that began several meetings ago. I think we can say that the opposition members have already made up their minds.
The last time I was in the House of Commons was on March 11, when Bill was introduced. That evening, I took the time to listen to all the debates in the House. Time and time again, members of the opposition, particularly the Conservatives, established links between prorogation and the WE Charity speech. I know they want to hear further witnesses at the committee, and I also think they want to reopen this debate.
I find it unfortunate that we are still debating this issue today. After all the attempts by the opposition members to make WE Charity the subject of this study, I was hoping that they would have finally moved on, but we are still here today. It's really unfortunate, because we want to work on issues and studies that matter to parliamentarians and to Canadians, but we need to continue to pursue this issue.
Like my colleague Mr. Lauzon, this past weekend, I had the opportunity to phone my constituents on what is called an action weekend. At no time did people talk to me about prorogation or the study of the Standing Committee on Procedure and House Affairs. That said, what really came out of those conversations was vaccination. I could see that people were very hopeful. There was a light at the end of the tunnel as, finally, vaccination and delivery rates were gradually increasing.
[English]
Again, speaking about the many calls that I, my staff and volunteers have done over the past week, hearing about the issue of vaccination was really what was key and paramount to the people I spoke to. Prorogation certainly was not top of mind for people. I would again say that prorogation is not something that most Canadians think of day in and day out.
When it came to the issue of vaccination, when speaking to my constituents, again, they had hoped.... We know the big lift, as likes to say, is starting to occur now.
For me, I'm really excited when we're able to say to people that our original objective of having six million vaccines by the end of March is now not the case. We are actually going to have over 9.5 million vaccines in Canada by the end of next week. That's really exciting. I know that when constituents spoke to me this weekend, that's really what they were talking to me about.
They had questions about Pfizer, Moderna, AstraZeneca, and J and J. There are many opinions about that. However, what they also wanted us to focus on was making sure that Canadians had the right information about vaccines. They wanted to be reassured.
Health Canada regulators are doing a phenomenal job. When we hear that these folks are working around the clock to do the approval of vaccines, they really are. I know a lot of these people personally, and I can tell you that I see the black marks under their eyes, because they are literally working seven days a week to get the work done.
They deserve our congratulations. They are doing it because they want to keep Canadians safe. They also want to make sure that the work that needs to gets done, that we are not taking shortcuts and that vaccines are being approved in Canada.
What Canadians want is for us to protect their health and safety and their families'. They recognize that we need to get vaccines in arms as quickly as possible if we want to get a handle on COVID-19.
I also think what people are concerned about as well right now.... Again, I find it quite disturbing and really unfortunate that we're here debating this matter. Canadians are also really concerned about the third wave that's probably upon us right now. I shouldn't say “probably”; it is upon us.
Coming from New Brunswick, our numbers are a lot lower per capita, and I'm very pleased about that, but I'm concerned about all provinces and territories. Today alone—I was just looking at the numbers this morning—in the province of Ontario, we have 372 people right now who are in the ICU. That is the highest number since the peak of the second wave. The third wave is upon us in some areas, and it's really important to make sure that we continue to have all hands on deck to do the work that needs to be done.
Not only do we have to have vaccines in arms, but we have to continue to practise the public health guidelines. Last year, none of us knew what that was. We didn't talk about public health guidelines as much as we do now. However, we know that we have to do that. We have to have a multipronged approach to effectively gain control of this situation. I'm proud, as Canadians, that we continue to do that.
Again, in Ontario they were saying that over the past 24 hours, they've had 33 new admissions in ICU. We know that these numbers are creeping up again, so we have to work together and we have to make sure we have all hands on deck.
What Canadians want us to focus on is the issue of vaccines. They are really proud of the work that has been doing on this file. She's been doing a lot of heavy lifting. The job has not been easy and she continues to push those targets, because again, we want to make sure that the numbers of vaccines coming in are coming in as quickly as possible.
If I look at the province of New Brunswick, our small little province here on the east coast, population 750,000 total, and the number of vaccines coming in, that's what the people in my riding are really concerned about and really excited about. I quickly went through some of the lists of the numbers we're seeing in the province of New Brunswick. Last week, the week of March 15, we saw 9,300 vaccines come into our province. However, this next week—how exciting—we're receiving almost 25,000 vaccines.
That number continues on that trajectory, and that is without the additional 1.5 million AstraZeneca vaccines we are receiving from the U.S. We can see that the work we are doing is going to continue to ramp up and ramp up. From there, the speed that we can get vaccines into the arms of Canadians is absolutely key.
I also have to give a shout-out to Major-General Fortin, who has been doing a phenomenal job with respect to the issue of vaccine delivery across the country. We certainly recognize that is not a small feat. It's the biggest challenge, I am sure, that he's had in his career, probably, when it comes to logistics, but he's doing a great job and working collaboratively with provinces and territories to make sure that provinces get the supplies they need.
The other thing, as well, that I want to comment on was mentioned to me this week. Many Canadians aren't aware that the federal government is not only procuring the vaccines that are needed, but also all of the equipment that is needed to make sure those vaccines get into the arms of Canadians.
When we look at all of the PPE, the needles, the swabs and all the rest of it, a lot of work has been done in that area to make sure that we not only have the vaccines but the tools. If we don't have the tools that are needed to administer the vaccines, we're not going to be ahead.
Again, has done a phenomenal job in that area, in making sure that people have access to the tools.
I have to also comment that not all countries were as well prepared to have those additional tools that were needed. Some countries, because they didn't have the tools, weren't able to administer the vaccine. Therefore, we can see that has taken a global approach to making sure that all that was needed was—
:
Absolutely. Thank you, Ms. Vecchio.
With respect to the tools and the procurement that was needed—and, again, this would be the area of priority that Canadians want us to focus on and what is really important for them right now—these are the types of things that people were mentioning to me.
With regard to the issue of prorogation, I can't say it came up at all in my conversations last weekend or during my busy week in the riding when I had meetings with many constituents.
If I focus again on the province of New Brunswick with respect to the PPE that the federal government has been able to procure, the province of New Brunswick has received 377,488 rapid tests for our little province alone. We have procured 578,000 pairs of gloves for frontline workers; disposable gowns, 5,900; respirators, 142,000; and surgical masks of all types, over 62,000.
Canadians want us to be prepared. They want us to make sure that, with the big lift of vaccines, we have the tools that are needed to administer them. I can see that our ministers have been hard at work making sure that gets done.
The other thing as well that I heard during my phone calls this weekend—and, again, my friend and colleague, Monsieur Lauzon, mentioned it—was on the issue of seniors. We have certainly recognized—again, we have said it time and time again—that the pandemic has certainly shone the light on the many inequalities and also the many vulnerabilities that exist within our system. The issue of people in long-term care facilities has certainly been key and highlighted and is really disturbing for all Canadians.
Throughout this pandemic, our government has tried to work hard with provinces and territories to make sure they received the additional supports that were needed, because we recognize that the issue of long-term care falls in the responsibilities of the provinces and territories. However, at the end of the day, I think it's all of our responsibility to make sure that our seniors are well taken of. They worked so hard to build this country that we are privileged to live in, and we have to be sure we are there for them. We have provided additional funding, through the safe restart agreement, in order to prevent and control outbreaks of infection. We have to continue working closely with them to make sure they receive those supports.
What's the relevancy is perhaps being asked. This weekend, again, the issue of prorogation was not the issue that was coming up. These are the issues, the long conversations that people wanted to have and wanted to make sure that our government was really focused on.
We have heard too many stories...and, yes, in my province of New Brunswick as well, we have had some outbreaks in facilities. We know how difficult it has been for our seniors. It has been difficult for our family members. It has been difficult for everyone involved. We have to make sure that our seniors are better protected and that support workers receive the training they need, the protection they need and the wage increase they need. Again, there's a lot of work that needs to be done, and I'm happy that our government has been able to work with the provinces and territories. That is going to continue in the short term, but also it has to continue for the long term.
The other thing as well that was brought to mind many times last week was the issue of long-term care standards. This is not something we can take lightly. It's something that we have to continue to work on with provinces and territories to make sure we get this done right.
The approach that “Ottawa knows best” is not the approach that is needed. We have to work in close collaboration with leading experts and also with the provinces and territories. The reality in New Brunswick is probably not the reality in Etobicoke, or in Whitby perhaps, or other areas of the country. I don't know the names of all the ridings of my colleagues, so I'm trying to divide them up.
I think we have to look at what national standards are needed to make sure that everyone at least gets a level of care that is similar across the country, just like our health care system. When we look at the Canada Health Act, we have a Canada Health Act that's imposed in order to make sure people have access to similar services. Again, we want to make sure, through our long-term care standards that we are going to be putting in place, that people are going to have access to similar types of services, and that should be expected of all.
Another thing I want to mention really quickly, which I think is good news when we talk about long-term care, is that we've seen thus far with our vaccine rollout that, as of last week, 89% of people in long-term care have finally been inoculated. That's really good news. I know it certainly warmed my heart when my 99-year-old aunt, Lillian, called me to say that she had gotten her vaccine. She was pretty happy. We need to make sure that we continue and that everyone who can be inoculated will be, but again, we have a lot of other folks we certainly have to focus on.
Another point that came out for me during the conversations this past week—and again, I don't want to take all the time, and I want to make sure that I share my time with other colleagues who have a lot of things to say—is that a lot of people were focusing on seniors who are living at home. I talked about 89% of seniors who live in long-term care facilities being inoculated, but in my province we're still at people 85 and over having appointments booked. Slowly but surely the age is going down. People in long-term care have been inoculated, but those who are living at home still have to wait for when their turn comes up on the list.
We're fortunate in New Brunswick. We have over 200 pharmacies that are providing the vaccines, so the rollout is going well.
I really have to give a shout-out to Dr. Jennifer Russell. She appeared before our committee during our study on election preparedness. Dr. Russell and her team have really done a great job of informing New Brunswickers and of keeping New Brunswickers safe. At the end of the day, Dr. Russell has the trust of New Brunswickers. Every day at two o'clock people still tune in to hear her message. That's where the decisions need to be. The decisions need to be with our public health experts and not with politicians. We need to rely on their expertise in order to move forward.
Coming back to what I was going to mention about seniors who are at home, I know I've heard from a lot of them and, I can tell you, when they got me on the phone last week they certainly wanted to talk and had a lot of thoughts to share about the handling of the pandemic. Overall, again, they were satisfied with the work that has been done, but a lot of them indicated to me that they were really lonely. This past year has been tough on them. We have these little bubbles, but many of them couldn't go out and their bubble was really limited.
They want to make sure that we continue to work hard in order, again, to get vaccines into arms but also to make sure that we do all that we can to prevent that third wave from happening, because they want life to get back to some sense of normalcy again—whatever that new normal is going to look like.
I think we all can be of the opinion that probably normal is not going to be what it was before. I think we're all going to be changing our habits, and that's not a bad thing. I think the quicker we can get to whatever that new sense of normalcy is going to be, the more beneficial it will be to all of us for our physical health and also our mental health.
When I was speaking to my seniors this weekend, prorogation was not an issue that came up. What they did talk to me about was making sure that governments provided additional services to people who were actually living at home. In the province of New Brunswick, the issue of connectivity sometimes comes up. I'm fortunate that in my riding we have high-speed Internet pretty well all over the place, but I know it's not the reality for folks across the province.
We talked a lot about some different types of investments that we've made and perhaps some financial support that we've been able to provide, as my friend and colleague Monsieur Lauzon indicated. I'm not going to go over the comments with respect to the amounts of money that have been given to individuals, but I do know that in my riding there are a lot of great community organizations that provide support to seniors and that things had to change because of the pandemic, because we couldn't have that physical contact with each other. I was really pleased a few weeks ago that we were able to make a few phone calls to folks in organizations in the area to tell them about some investments through the new horizons for seniors program, and I'm sure that probably all of us here in this committee have received some funding for different groups in our area. Sometimes they're not huge amounts of money, but it makes a huge difference to these organizations and how they can deliver services, and they can certainly stretch a dollar. This money goes far for them.
I'll give you just a bit of a snapshot of the types of investments we've been able to make and some groups that have benefited from them.
One group was the Canadian National Institute for the Blind. It wanted to provide some services to alleviate isolation for seniors who are visually impaired. Again, these are people who oftentimes would meet together in settings, and as a result of the pandemic they're no longer able to do that. This funding that we were able to provide for them is going to provide them outlets to alleviate that isolation that many seniors are going through.
We were also able to make some investments.... Again, this came up during one of my calls—prorogation didn't, but lawn bowling in my riding did, believe it or not. The Centennial Lawn Bowling Club has received some funding, and it's to increase their amount of equipment and to give people lessons and courses on lawn bowling. Spring is upon us, even in New Brunswick; it is going to start soon, and we know that physical distancing is possible when doing outside sports. They were thrilled to get some additional funding, and they'll be able to increase their participation when it comes to that program.
Another group that received funding was the Codiac Woodworkers Guild. A lot of people, like seniors, who have woodworking experience will be sharing their tricks of the trade and encouraging people to get involved, all while respecting social distancing.
I had to laugh. Last year I visited one of these groups, and many of the seniors who have now moved into apartments have donated all of their woodworking equipment to these seniors facilities and are using their own equipment to teach people. It's like a win-win for these folks because they didn't know whom to donate their equipment to. Their children in many cases didn't want the equipment, but these seniors still feel really valued. As a result, through the additional funding that we were able to provide to them, we can see that it's going to make a difference. Again, seniors want us to work on their priorities and provide them with the assistance and additional funding they need to help them during the really trying times of the pandemic.
I could go on and on, but I'm probably going to save a few examples in the event that we...wanting to share a bit of what's going on in the riding. However, one other thing I wanted to comment on was the United Way of the greater Moncton area. I know that many of you probably have United Way agencies, and the one in Moncton does phenomenal work throughout the southeastern part of the province.
This time around, with the monies we've provided to the United Way through the new horizons for seniors program, they have also received a grant, meaning that seniors are preparing meals for seniors and delivering them at home. They've seen that, throughout the pandemic, this has been really needed because many seniors haven't been able to go to food banks or get the additional support they need. This meal delivery program has made a huge difference in their lives, and we will hopefully continue to support them and find ways to support them as well.
I mentioned a lot of these types of examples today because, first of all, they speak to the pride of my riding. I'm really proud and pleased with the work that many committed people are doing in the riding. I also mentioned them to demonstrate that at this point in time, Canadians want us to focus on what's really important to them.
Talking about the WE Charity and other things is not a priority in the minds of Canadians. I know that people have indicated that this is about the study on prorogation. However, over the past several meetings we've had at PROC, a group of people has provided us with valuable expertise on prorogation. We've had academics. We've also had the House leader, who came forward to provide us with testimony, very openly and transparently, with his bureaucrats, on the reason for prorogation.
I truly believe that at this point in time, we are at the point that we should start writing our report with respect to our recommendations.
[Translation]
Again, I think it is time we wrote the report on our study on prorogation. It makes no sense to ask the or anyone else to come back here. It is obvious that the opposition members are fixated on one thing. They are convinced that they will find a smoking gun. Yet, after hearing all the witnesses who appeared in the WE Charity study, it is clear that there is no scandal in this story. So, I think it is time to start writing our report. This way, we can continue our important work for Canadians.
Frankly, why call all these witnesses if, according to the opposition, they are all guilty of something already?
The opposition parties have already made their views on this clear and public.
As I was saying last week, when we were debating the assisted dying bill in the evening, even then, time and time again, I heard people make that comment about prorogation and WE Charity. I really don't think we have anything to gain by continuing to invite witnesses.
Madam Chair, to conclude, I have a few comments to make before I hand the floor over to my honourable colleagues.
I understand the frustration of my colleagues in the opposition. They have tried for months to make this an issue in several committees and in the media, and have gotten nowhere. Now, they are trying one last time to embarrass the government with the WE Charity issue. Again, this has nothing to do with prorogation. This request for additional witnesses and documents is nothing more than an attempt to slow down the work of the government, to bog down civil servants in paperwork and to waste their time reviewing documents rather than working on implementing the government's agenda.
Madam Chair, this concludes my comments.
[English]
I would also like to give a notice of motion at this point in time, if I'm able to. Is that okay, Madam Chair?
:
Thank you, Madam Chair. I did just send a copy in both official languages to the clerk, so that should have been received.
I appreciate Mr. Nater's attempt to “let's make a deal” the situation here, but I don't think we have unanimous consent.
I'm looking forward to delivering some prepared remarks. I've been spending a lot of time.... Continuing with the argument that I started in one of our previous meetings—I think it was actually two meetings ago—where I referenced a document by the chief statistician, it is a 134-page or 135-page report of key statistics that were gathered, or I guess collected and analyzed throughout the period from the beginning of the pandemic to around August 2020.
This information was relevant at the time of prorogation. I think it serves as a foundational document of extremely important and relevant data to inform evidence-based decision-making around resetting the government's agenda. I believe very strongly—and I'm going to argue today—that all of the data actually points to very specific and important themes that show up in the Speech from the Throne.
To me, this again provides significant rationale as to why prorogation was necessary and why a new Speech from the Throne was a chance to reflect the needs of Canadians, and also to check in with them through an extensive consultation process, which I've spoken about before.
The argument really starts off from.... I think the key argument I want to make is that if a global pandemic is not a good reason to prorogue Parliament, then really nothing is. That I think is something that the opposition parties around the table here should be keeping in mind.
I know that the opposition doesn't seem to be satisfied with that, and I feel as if they want to fabricate a narrative that suits their political purposes. Really, you could continue to deny that this is a legitimate and good rationale for the reasons that existed for prorogation, but I think that's denying the evidence and the science behind this and the specific facts about what actually happened following from prorogation.
I say good reasons and rational arguments, because we've seen recently that the Conservative Party in particular has even denied climate change being real, at their national convention. This again continues to show a disregard for scientific evidence and research.
I think that the hypocrisy is thick here, to be honest. Harper prorogued four times in the better part of a decade when he served as prime minister. No disrespect to Stephen Harper or to the Conservative Party, or any of its members, but the party spokesperson gave reasons each time, especially in 2008 and 2009. All of the reasons given were very consistent with concerns about an economic crisis or recession at the time and wanting to check in with Canadians, key stakeholders and opposition parties.
My argument is this. The global pandemic that we've been living through over the last year and responding to as a government is at least 10 times greater than the recession in 2008 and 2009. If we are sitting around the table and honestly thinking that proroguing Parliament wasn't justified, it just seems hypocritical to me, especially when the economic crisis is so much worse. Mind you, this is a public health crisis first and foremost, but it has economic and social implications that are deep and far reaching.
We all have been living through that together, and it's been challenging for every Canadian out there, every one of us, for sure. I feel very privileged to be serving Canadians at this time, and advocating for them first and foremost. However, we're not immune to the impacts as well. We've all experienced losses in our families, local businesses, the isolation, mental health challenges. The list goes on and on.
We're all feeling this and getting through it together, and I really wish that instead of debating this motion, which seems to be about nothing more than political games, we could get down to the business that matters to Canadians. It would be really great.
My colleagues Ms. Petitpas Taylor and Mr. Lauzon painted the picture, from their perspectives, of what their constituents are asking about today. This study is not on their minds. I would even venture to say that it is almost completely irrelevant to Canadians right now. That's a bold statement, I know, because I think many opposition members are committed to pursuing it, but I am still struggling to understand why. I guess I'm really at a loss, because I have to assume it is, again, only for political purposes.
I want to reference a couple of statements that were made in the media in relation to the 2008 and 2009 prorogations of former prime minister Stephen Harper. One of them was in a 2008 CTV article. This is a direct quote:
Last Friday I asked Canadians to give us their opinion on the parliamentary situation. That feedback has been overwhelming and very clear. They want Canada's government to continue to work on the agenda they voted for—our plan to strengthen the economy.
This is, again, referring to prorogation, and it's very clear from this statement that this was a chance to work on the agenda. It was assumed not only that the agenda was not abandoned but also that prorogation was justified based on wanting to strengthen the economy and look at how the government could do that at the time.
In a Toronto Star article on the same prorogation in 2008, this statement was made: “It's the opportunity to work in the next six weeks on these measures, and I invite all the opposition parties, especially those that have a responsibility to the whole of Canada, to work with us, to inform us of their detailed position and we will be there to listen.”
Again, this expresses the idea of consultation with opposition parties, responsibility to Canadians and a chance to reflect and listen. That was used as justification in 2008 by the Conservative government at the time.
One could criticize whether prorogation was necessary again a year later, in 2009, but I won't go there today. For our purposes, I want to clarify what reasons were given, which I think are very consistent with the reasons that our government has given. This is my point about hypocrisy being kind of thick at this moment in time.
In the Toronto Star, Dimitri Soudas, whom I've never met but I understand was the spokesperson for former prime minister Stephen Harper, said at the time that with the recession easing, it was “time to engage with constituents, stakeholders and businesses in order to listen to Canadians, identify priorities and to set the next stage of our agenda.”
This was about resetting the agenda coming out of an economic recession that was slightly easing. One could draw a very similar parallel between the easing first wave of COVID-19, with its economic impacts, and the chance to re-evaluate and do the consultation necessary with constituents, stakeholders and businesses to reset the agenda. This is exactly the same. It's so blatantly parallel that it's hard for anybody to deny.
In a CBC News article from Ottawa, Dimitri Soudas said, “This is quite routine”, referring to prorogation, “but it is also important to give Canadians an overview of where we will be taking the country over the next little while.” In a CTV article, Soudas said, “'There's nothing out of the ordinary about doing this”, referring to prorogation. Then in Maclean's, Soudas said that a new parliamentary session was needed to set in motion “basically the next phase of the economic action plan.”
All of these statements made in the media to justify prorogation in 2008 and 2009 were almost identical, only we have to remember that the government of the day, in the four times it prorogued, didn't provide any evidence or any report to the House to justify why it had prorogued. Sure, Canadians were left guessing and, sure, these reasons were given in the media, but that was acceptable at the time.
Our government introduced a change to the Standing Orders that required transparency around this process. Here we have opposition parties now trying to claim that we haven't been transparent, and they want to do an extensive study that's already been done multiple times at other committees. This is a rinse and repeat until they get what they want, which is holding up the very important work that this committee could be doing.
I want to speak directly to Ms. Vecchio's livestreamed constituents. I know she's livestreaming this on her Facebook account, but I really think this is—
To round out that point, it's very hard and rich specifically for the Conservative party to be saying that our government lacks transparency around this when the pandemic presents at least 10 times the impact....
We amended the Standing Orders previously. We complied with that standing order and produced a report. We've had the come and speak to us. We've done a study. We've entertained this in terms of understanding the rationale for prorogation and still they persist in wasting this committee's time.
I do believe it's a waste of time. I'm sitting here and I'm preparing for hours and hours to speak to this motion, which I fundamentally disagree with. I will not stop arguing for it to be defeated. I will not stop, because it is a waste of our time.
We're here to serve Canadians. We're here to do work that matters to Canadians. I would like to be talking about misinformation within the elections process and what we can do about combatting misinformation. I think there are so many other things we could be doing.
The safe passage of the bill that was put forward, I think it's Bill —sometimes I get the numbers mixed up, because so many things are happening. It's the bill we worked on. We did some great work in this committee, some really fantastic, non-partisan work to move us forward as a country, understanding that if an election is called.... I know we all don't want an election. We looked at what we need to do if it's called to ensure that Canadians are safe, they can exercise their democratic rights and they can vote within a safe electoral process.
That work is so impactful and important. Here we are debating this instead of moving that. We could be doing a prestudy on that bill to make sure the bill itself passes more quickly when it does come to our committee. There are so many better things we could focus our attention on right now that are more relevant to Canadians.
This is just the start of my remarks today. I have a lot more to say. I will try to be brief, but I do have a lot to say. I've been reading extensively and preparing for this conversation.
I know that, as a new member of Parliament, it's my job to speak and advocate for the things I believe in and that I think my constituents would want me to be saying and doing. I'm very conscious of that, and I take that very seriously. Like Mr. Lauzon, Ms. Petitpas Taylor and all my colleagues, we're working hard for Canadians.
I also want to point to something else that is a key piece of evidence, that if I were a witness on this committee I would introduce.
Experts say this pandemic has been approximately 10 times worse than the recession in 2008 and 2009. They are almost incomparable. When we look at the statistics, the recession in 2008 and 2009 is a blip compared with the economic impacts of this public health crisis that we're all living through and trying to manage our country through.
I want to refer to a specific article in BNN Bloomberg on April 27, 2020. The title of it is “COVID-19 to spur depression '10 times worse' than 2008”. I have a whole host of other articles, but I'm just referring to that one so it's on the record. It's not just me saying this. I'm not making this stuff up. I'm reading expert opinions and advice and bringing that to the committee.
I would also add that one can't even say that we can use what we learned from 2008-09 and apply it to the current health crisis and the induced economic crisis based on our public health crisis. They're so different in attributes and characteristics. I started to say this last time, and I'm prepared to talk more about this in the future. I think there's a very big difference between a supply-side recession and a demand-side recession. Economists have done a lot of analysis to look at the differences between 2008-09 and the 2020-21 economic crisis.
I would just say maybe “to be continued”, but it's not just 10 times worse. It's completely different. We can't even necessarily apply some of the learning from that past crisis to this one, because it doesn't really apply. There may be some aspects of it that do, but I think it's pretty important to point out that they're qualitatively different, and this one is much more complex and deeper.
Getting back to my original argument, I referred to the report from Statistics Canada. I've read it pretty much cover to back numerous times. I've made notes about it. I think it's important. The reason I think it's important is that the key message in the throne speech that I found opposition parties would contest and trivialize and call a “buzz term” or a “catchphrase” is this message of “build back better”, which I know some people may perceive as a buzz phrase, a catchphrase, a talking point or something.
It certainly may sound like that to you, but to me, and based on all the evidence I see from Statistics Canada, I believe this message that we need to build a sustainable, resilient, inclusive and equitable economy moving forward resonates with the majority of Canadians—and now is the time.
Just as we always say that COVID-19 is an unprecedented crisis and that we haven't seen this in 100 years, we also have an opportunity, coming out of this, to really address the deep inequities in our society and our economy and to ensure we have an economy that works for everyone, that builds pathways to social and economic inclusion and that, more than anything else—we have to make sure—protects our planet.
To me, if you believe in social justice and environmental sustainability, our Speech from the Throne really would speak to you. That message of “build back better” isn't just a buzz phrase or catchphrase. It's something that we believe in and that stakeholders across this country have been echoing. They've been echoing it because it resonates with them, not because it's a talking point or a.... I don't trivialize that. It encapsulates what people want to see in the future of this country.
What I want to do is bring it back to the statistics and the information that we have, and specifically the information that was available at the time of prorogation, which is relevant. The economic crisis and the social impacts of COVID-19 have gone through a second wave and, now, as Ms. Petitpas Taylor rightly pointed out, we're in a third wave. We're going to experience that, I guess exponentially, in that third wave.
I want to get down to making my argument. That was a bit of a preamble, but I wanted to outline the overall architecture of the argument I'm making. I really think it's important for you as members of this committee to know where I'm going with all of this. Now I'm going to provide you with evidence, research and information that I think substantiates it.
First of all, on the economic impacts in general, there's a whole bunch of categories to the economic impact in general. There was an unprecedented decline in outputs. Again, this is based on August 2020, and it's five times greater than 2008, with the worst impact on the economy in the service-based industries. Real GDP fell by 2.9% in 2009. Real GDP fell by 12% in 2020, and that was only after the first wave. Already, you can see that the impact was greater and that was only during the first wave.
I want to quote from this report by the chief statistician of Canada. I'm not sure whether this should be attributed to the person who wrote the report, because there's probably a whole team that worked on it, but I will just quote it:
The road to recovery will involve major adaptations for businesses and households, which poses challenges for an equitable and resilient recovery.
It's interesting that those phrases should be used at a fairly early point in that report, but I certainly think this is relevant to where I'm going with this argument.
Another point that I think is important to keep in mind is that historic declines in all economic activities were experienced. Those include imports, exports, business investment, household spending and real GDP at market prices. Those are five categories. Not only did real GDP fall, but all of these other economic activities also experienced historic declines.
In Q2 2020, household spending had decreased by 13%. Employment earnings fell by 9%. Our government's emergency relief measures ensured that Canadian families got direct payments through the CERB and other income supports. Those led to disposable income and household savings actually increasing eventually. They went from 8% to 28%. That was based on a reduced cost of living, and this will also ensure that people spend—
:
My sentiments are really that we're amending to cut out portions of this that I think are not valid or useful for pursuing the reasons for prorogation. I think renewing the invitations to the and the is particularly relevant given what we've been saying, which is that the rationale for prorogation was based on these deep inequities we're experiencing. The pandemic has hit sectors very differently. I prepared lots of data and information in my remarks to demonstrate to you just how far-reaching and how deep the impacts are in terms of inequity and whom those impacts are predominately hitting.
Youth are one of those groups, almost above any other group. Women and visible minorities are the other two major segments of our Canadian society that are disproportionately impacted by COVID-19. There's a lot of robust information on that.
I'll use this as an example to illustrate my point. First of all, a quarter of families did not have savings to avoid poverty, to get them through two months. New Canadians, lower-educated workers and diverse population groups struggled the most, but it was over a quarter of families. A third of families did not have enough savings to handle a three-month work stoppage. The financial vulnerability was pronounced in people under 35, unmarried men and women, and single mothers. Those were highlighted in the statistics of the report I was previously highlighting.
In addition to that, visible minority groups were at higher risk of work stoppage. The percentage of workers employed in accommodation and food services and arts and entertainment were disproportionately.... Minority groups were overrepresented, specifically Korean, Japanese, Southeast Asian, Filipino and Chinese people. Therefore, they had much higher risks of work stoppage. They were experiencing that very differently from the rest of the population. Poverty rates also were highest among Korean, West Asian, Arab, Chinese, Japanese, Black and Southeast Asian individuals.
There was an unequal impact on low-wage workers, far greater than in 2008-09. In the average monthly layoff rates of employees by wage decile comparison, I looked at the bottom decile, which is the bottom 10%. In 2007, the monthly layoff rate was 1.8%. In 2009, the bottom decile experienced a 2% layoff rate. In 2020, that was 13%. In other words, the lowest-wage workers were the ones who got hit the hardest with the most layoffs. Visible minorities and new Canadians were overrepresented in those groups. The impact was six to seven times greater than in the 2008-09 recession, and again, that was just after the first wave.
Also I think we need to note that unequal economic impacts reached other portions of the population: youth, less educated workers, women, recent immigrants and temporary employees. The difference between temporary and permanent is really significant. If you're a temporary employee between 25 and 50 years old, the job rates experienced by August 2020 are 20% lower compared to 2019. If you compare it year over year, there is 20% lower employment for temporary employees.
When you compare that to permanent employee job losses, year over year, you see that it was only 3% in the same age category. This 3% and 20% difference highlights just how much more frequently temporary employees were laid off as a result of the pandemic. The explanation for that is quite simple. I think we all realize this intuitively, but people with permanent jobs more frequently can do them from home. Many of the more temporary jobs out there were those that were likely on the front lines and in sectors that were the most impacted.
I want to reference youth for the moment, because I think this speaks to why the should be invited to come back to the committee. Youth were probably the hardest hit. It's hard to actually identify which one of these equity-seeking groups would be the hardest hit, but certainly youth have been hit extremely hard. I want to give you a few pieces of evidence for that.
Employment loss is greatest among youth, with 870,000 job losses. That's just within the first wave of the pandemic. These statistics aren't up to date because, again, we're talking about prorogation. I've only looked at data and information that would have been relevant at the time of prorogation, which would have been up to and around August. All of this data only reflects March to August 2020.
There were 870,000 job losses. There was a weaker recovery among young Canadians after the first wave. There was that period in the summer of 2020 when there was certainly a significant dip in the case numbers and there was some recovery happening. I have a lot of information about what that looked like. Full-time work among young Canadians was down by 23% and dropped even more for young women. It dropped by 30%.
In fact, young women were probably the hardest hit. Approximately 50% of young women work in retail and the food service and/or accommodation industries. Those two industries were the hardest hit. I say they are two industries because retail is separate from food service and accommodation.
Retail did start to bounce back, but obviously got hit again by the second wave and another set of public health restrictions. Youth would have felt that disproportionately, because approximately 50% of young women work in those two industries. That's pretty high. That's for young women. Why are young women disproportionately impacted? Because they more often work in retail and food service and accommodation.
Young workers entering the labour market will also take an earnings hit for up to five years. This is really an interesting statistic. Young people aren't just taking a hit during the pandemic. Their income earnings are expected to decline for up to five years or more.
First of all, the youth unemployment rate hit the historic high of 19% during the pandemic. The cumulative earnings loss estimated by Statistics Canada would equal between $8,000 to $15,000 over that five-year period. Basically, youth are taking an earnings loss as a result of the pandemic.
Even in our recovery period, they're still likely going to take a hit. How can we address that? I think that's a key question that prorogation would have been entertaining. What can we do about this inequity that youth are experiencing? That probably exacerbates some of the inequities they already experience.
The percentage of workers facing high risk of job transition is another really important point here. Basically, we all know that this pandemic has increased the trend of teleworking, but it's also increased the trend of digitalization which, in many respects, actually means not just teleworking but also the automation of jobs.
Whose jobs are at highest risk of being displaced by or replaced by automation? In fact, it's people whose jobs require less education. Essentially, the less educated you are, the more likely you are to be in a job that's at high risk of being replaced by automation. This highlights another extremely important equity issue.
The other thing that's interesting to note is that, according to the statistics for teleworking, basically the lowest-wage jobs were likeliest to be replaced by automation and the highest-paid jobs were likeliest to be able to be done from home. Just think about the equity issue that creates for our recovery as a country.
These are things that the could definitely speak to. That's why I think those witnesses are still potentially relevant for this study—hence the amendment.
In terms of the overall economic impact, I think the reason the amendment still includes a renewed invitation to the previous minister of finance, the Honourable Bill Morneau, and the new is that they would both be able to speak to the specific economic impacts of this crisis, including at the time of prorogation, which I think is all the more relevant.
This speaks to why this amendment makes sense, from my perspective, and why it is an improvement to Ms. Vecchio's original motion. I hope members of this committee will support this amendment. I will be greatly interested in hearing what other members of the committee think.
Perhaps, just before I close, I'll add a little bit more emphasis to the remarks I prepared. I think they relate to the amendment, which is on the depth of the economic impact we've seen, which is the reason for reinviting the . I'm sure she's studied these impacts greatly and her team has been seized with understanding the full scope and depth of the economic scarring and how to recover from this. I think that's relevant information that would help substantiate the reason for prorogation.
We know there have been historic declines in labour market activity. There were employment losses of three million workers between February and April of 2020. Employment rose by 1.9 million jobs between April and August, so you can see very quickly that there was quite a significant recovery. That's still a net loss of 1.1 million jobs, but 1.9 million jobs did come back, essentially after the first wave, rather quickly.
Our government had worked really hard to create jobs across Canada, and we had a historic low in February of 5.6%. That number jumped to 13.7% in May, but then started to fall back down in July and August. In August it was 10.2%, so we were starting to recover. That was nowhere near, obviously, where we started, which was at 5.6%, which was great, but it was a telltale sign that what we were doing was having an impact.
As to the employment rate, which is the flip side of this, we started in February at 61.8%, so almost 62% of Canadians were employed out of those who are of the age that Statistics Canada uses. That number fell to 52.1% in April, then rose again in July to 57.3% and was at 58% in August. This is only roughly 4% below where we started in February, and in August things were starting to look better.
We can assess the recovery to date based on this time period, up to August 2020. Between February and April, 5.5 million Canadian workers had been affected negatively by the public health measures that were implemented. This wouldn't all have been job losses. Some of it was about income earned for workers who are paid hourly. However, by August the number of impacted workers had fallen to 1.8 million. Again, we were starting to recover pretty significantly if you think about those numbers. About 3.7 million workers had recovered from the losses and negative impacts they had experienced between February and April, so there's lots to consider here.
I will cede the floor now and give an opportunity to some of my colleagues on the committee to make some remarks about the amendment that I've put forward. I hope we can get somewhere in this meeting and move on with this.
:
Thank you, Madam Chair.
The point is that none of us will ever forget 2020. It's been a year of tears, tragedy and trials. The pandemic turned our lives upside down under lockdowns, office buildings emptied, streets quieted and schools closed, and Canadians and communities adapted.
There are so many Canadians to thank for adapting, including health workers in the William Osler Health System and the Rexdale Community Health Centre in our Etobicoke North community for their dedication and sacrifice, as well as other essential workers who kept our country running, and Canadians across the country who learned to work, learn and live in new ways. They followed science and public health and safety protocols, and they stood up to COVID-19 deniers and disinformation. They all helped save lives.
Instead of focusing on the pandemic that continues to rage with new waves of sickness and death, we have a motion before this committee that focuses on politics. Again, I will of course support my colleague Mr. Turnbull's recommendation.
Every day, Canadians are becoming sick with COVID-19 and being hospitalized, and they are dying. We are still fighting the pandemic. A few days ago, the director-general of the World Health Organization made the point that after six weeks of declining cases in January and February, we are now on track for a fourth consecutive week of increasing cases. Cases globally are increasing in most regions, and while the number of deaths is still declining, it is doing so at a slower rate. The director-general explained that these are worrying trends due to the variants, the opening up of society and inequitable vaccine rollout.
Thankfully, here in Canada, the largest immunization campaign in our country's history is well under way. According to our country's top vaccine coordinator, there should be enough COVID-19 vaccines available to give every Canadian who's eligible a first dose by the end of June.
The pandemic isn't over, and until all Canadians have access to a safe and effective vaccine, we all need to continue to follow public health advice. That means working from home if you can, keeping two metres apart from others, wearing a mask and downloading the COVID alert app.
COVID-19 is the most challenging crisis we have faced since World War II. It is not finished, and the global vaccine rollout has been far from even and fair, yet we have a motion aimed at scoring political points.
We have new variants. Even if we suppress the virus in one country but it is allowed to spread to other parts of the world, the variants can cause new outbreaks, even in countries that seem to have the virus under control. Vaccines are necessary to help the world move from locking down societies to locking down the virus.
Many low-income countries have not yet received a single dose of vaccine, and there are many examples of vaccine hoarding. If we do not ensure vaccine equity, the virus will continue to spread and to mutate and will ultimately prolong the pandemic and our vulnerability with devastating impacts.
Canada has agreed to top up its funding for vaccine rollouts in lower-income countries, pledging $75 million more for the COVAX international vaccine-sharing program. As our wealthy countries step up their commitments, the new pledge brings Canada's total contribution to $940 million.
We must remember that we are one human family. We are interdependent. What happens to one person can quickly affect many others. You only have to remember that our cluster of pneumonia cases just over a year ago has translated into almost 123 million confirmed cases of COVID-19 and 2.8 million deaths. That's a real increase since our last meeting.
As of March 19, over 390 million vaccine doses had been administered worldwide. While the world needs to unite to produce and distribute sufficient vaccines for all, which means at least doubling manufacturing capacity around the world, this committee is arguing about partisan politics. We have to keep fighting COVID-19 and rolling out the vaccine to as many Canadians who want it, as quickly as possible. We have to stay focused on what matters most to Canadians: their health and safety, jobs, livelihoods and the economic recovery.
Each of us here knows COVID-19 very personally. We have to think about the children and what the pandemic has meant to them. Imagine being five and COVID-19 having taken up 20% of your life, with having to stare at a screen to learn, not seeing your friends, playing in the schoolyard or attending birthday parties. Imagine being 15 and COVID-19 having taken up about 7% of your life, with lost connections to lifelong friends, lost activities and lessons, mental stress and uncertainty about the future. We have asked so much of children and young people. Life and health are precious. People of all ages are valuable.
I think of seniors. Everyone will remember Captain Tom Moore. As he approached his 100th birthday he decided to try to raise 1,000 pounds for the United Kingdom's National Health Service by completing 100 laps of his garden. He ended up raising more than 30 million pounds and received a knighthood for his service. Captain Tom, Sir Tom, became a symbol of hope for millions around the world. He demonstrated that although older people are among the most at risk from COVID-19, they make incredible contributions to our society.
Closer to home, in our Etobicoke North community our seniors make a real difference in brighter times, volunteering at hospitals, teaching language and culture, tending community gardens and looking after the next generation. We also have wonderful seniors' clubs in Etobicoke North. Many of them meet daily. They talk, play bingo and cards, and they eat and pray together. They are there for one another. They support each other. They deliver food to one another when they are sick or grieving.
The clubs are lifelines, but it's COVID-19 right now. These are hard times, and our clubs cannot meet. Seniors have lost their connections, friendships and their lifelines. COVID-19 not only changed seniors' daily routines but also the care and support they receive and how they are perceived.
My heart breaks for those in long-term care. During the first wave of COVID-19, 70% of the deaths were of those over age 80, or about twice the rates of other developed countries. It tragically happened again in wave two. The greatest tragedy of this pandemic is the lives lost in long-term care homes. We have to root out a dangerous narrative that older people are frail, vulnerable and dispensable. This is absolutely wrong. Seniors helped build the country that we have inherited, and they deserve to be safe, to live with dignity and respect, and to receive the care and support they need.
Although long-term care falls under provincial and territorial jurisdiction, our government will take any action it can to support seniors, while working alongside the provinces and territories. Our government will work with Parliament on Criminal Code amendments to explicitly penalize those who neglect seniors under their care, putting them in danger.
Our government will also work with the provinces and territories to set new national standards for long-term care so that seniors get the best support possible, and we will take additional action to help people stay in their homes longer.
COVID-19 also hammered home that we need to address poverty, inequality, hunger and violence against women. I know that both of my colleagues Mr. Turnbull and Ms. Petitpas Taylor have spoken eloquently about both issues in the past.
However, instead of staying focused on Canadians and their needs, we have a political motion. Responding to COVID-19—recovering from the virus, learning lessons and preparing for the future—should be our focus. It should remain our focus.
We have all been touched by the pandemic, and we have to learn from the crisis. We can't forget what we've all been through. We need to prepare for the future, and this includes through our work at this very committee. This committee should focus on lessons learned and pandemic preparedness.
:
Dr. Duncan, thank you very much for your remarks. They were very interesting.
[Translation]
I want to come back to the amendment proposed by my colleague Mr. Turnbull.
At the outset, I made it clear that I did not think it is relevant to invite the to appear before the committee once again. The other amendments also seek to renew this invitation.
Mr. Turnbull has suggested some very good alternatives. Paragraph (a) talks about not asking the Prime Minister to appear before the committee. We remember very well why we concluded that it was not necessary to have the Prime Minister at the committee, especially since Mr. Pablo Rodriguez came to give evidence on behalf of the government.
What is important to recognize in paragraph (a) is that we did make some concessions. Indeed, our original objective was to defeat the motion and to move forward. Mr. Turnbull has gone a long way in replacing paragraph (b). He renewed the invitations to the and the for 90 minutes. Anyway, you already know the answers.
Out of respect, I will vote in favour of Mr. Turnbull's amendment, but you already know my opinion: I do not think it is necessary to invite them. However, in order to present my vision and the ideas that we can put forward to advance committee proceedings, I am prepared to make this concession, which for me is the biggest one I am prepared to make.
I'm ready to defend my arguments in direct relation to Mrs. Vecchio's motion.
We've made some changes to paragraph (c), but Mr. Turnbull still retains the essence of the paragraph, which is to renew the invitations to Mr. Bill Morneau, Mr. Craig Kielburger, and his brother, Mr. Marc Kielburger, to appear for 90 minutes. I think that brings us full circle to a series of testimonies that will allow us to conclude this study.
I hope that you'll accept Mr. Turnbull's amendment, because it will allow us to move on.
We've come a long way with this motion. We must remember where we're coming from to understand Mr. Turnbull's amendment. I was a latecomer to the committee, but on December 10, 2020, you were already talking about this motion.
On December 10, even before the whole process was set in motion, the reason for prorogation was already clear to some. I was WE Charity that was at issue. Despite the many nuances brought by several witnesses, people wouldn't budge about the reason for prorogation: it was still connected to WE Charity. Yet, more than 100 days have passed since December 10.
We have evolved since then. Many witnesses have come to different committees. We have to take into account that it is not only our committee that is moving forward. There are also other parliamentary committees, which have asked the same questions to the same people. We need to talk to each other. We need to look at what is being done elsewhere in order to move forward.
If we want to have a good economic recovery to fight this pandemic, we have to go ahead, to go for it, to bring innovative ideas and to be very imaginative. In the private sector, I've been on boards of directors, and I can tell you that there's not a lot of duplication and waste of time. If we ran a private company the way we run the Standing Committee on Procedure and House Affairs, we'd be in bankruptcy as we speak. There is no need for the CEO of a company to come into the hot seat for purely political purposes.
Today, we must take the opportunity to say that we have prorogued Parliament for very specific reasons. My colleague Mr. Turnbull has presented an alternative that already goes too far, but shows that we can move forward with teamwork.
I am convinced that we will all win if we include in the report everything that has been said and done so far.
I want to take this opportunity to thank you for the work you did before I arrived. I thank all those who took the time to write the report line by line. It allowed me to get on board at the same time as you to be in the same place. I am convinced that my reading has allowed me to be as informed as committee members who have been there from the beginning.
The proposed amendment makes the motion more viable, more humane and more achievable. I sincerely believe that it will allow us to collectively demonstrate to other committees and to our organization that we are capable of reaching a consensus and putting politics aside for a while. I am really eager to see the work of the committee move forward and to contribute to the progress of other issues.
I would remind you that the process started about 105 days ago and that a lot of water has flowed under the bridge since then. I could talk about the nuances brought by several witnesses, but the fact remains that when we started the process on December 10, some witnesses already had preconceived ideas about what the committee should recommend. So I want to show that progress has been made since December 10.
I know that the Standing Committee on Procedure and House Affairs is independent. However, we still have to look at other committees to determine exactly how we move forward in this committee.
I am not saying that we are dependent on the Standing Committee on Finance or the Standing Committee on Access to Information, Privacy and Ethics. What I'm saying is that listening to evidence and questions from other committees allows us to add to our report today by showing that we have met with the array of witnesses on the list. We could also add the questions and answers from , the , and the .
Today, this amendment by Mr. Ryan Turnbull prompts us to make a concrete decision on the nuance between what happened at the start on December 10 and what is happening today. It is no small thing to dedicate over 100 days to a study in government. Decisions taken on the spot in the private sector would not have taken more than 100 days. Of course, we are not in the private sector; we are in government.
I remember that when I entered politics in 2009, I thought there were two speeds: slow and standstill. Coming from a private company, I had difficulty getting used to the pace of politics, which included a lot of discussion. I realized that, in politics, mistakes are made when you go too fast.
This is more or less in line with what I said at the beginning. I was saying that we have indeed recognized that mistakes had been made, and by everyone. I also include myself, because I am one of the first culprits. I am usually the one who uses the expression
[English]
“I'm here to raise the flag.”
[Translation]
I missed out on a few opportunities to speak.
[English]
I didn't see the flag arrive.
[Translation]
I really missed the boat when we put in place bills that would have allowed a worker returning from the South to receive $1,000 for his quarantine. We managed to correct this situation. It's important to take a step back.
I want to highlight the testimony of Dr. Kathy Brock, who is a professor at the School of Policy Studies at Queen's University, on prorogation. It won't matter if we call the in to say that the reasons for prorogation in August were, first, to start over and to focus on the government's priorities after a situation had changed, and second, to take into account that the government was exhausted and under enormous pressure in 2020.
Although the opposition members were getting answers to all their questions, they were presenting complex problems that were the same as those experienced in our constituencies. Every day, we had meetings to try to find solutions. I have never seen so much accessibility to the organization and the administration to try to find solutions together. The reason for prorogation will make absolutely no difference today, 100 days after we started the study. The amendment proposed by Mr. Turnbull is THEREFORE extremely valid.
The Queen's University professor said that starting over is one thing. Today, the government and the public service were able to catch their breath. We've been able to take a breather and to start afresh. It is hard to be politicians during a pandemic; the population used us as punching bags. For a human being, it is not easy to take blows. In the ridings, many seniors are grouped together in the same place, in large residential centres or in long-term care facilities. These people are our builders, our grandparents, our friends, our acquaintances, our friends' fathers or mothers. We needed to take a step back. People should have thanked us for proroguing and for starting over with a vote of confidence and a Speech from the Throne, for thinking of the people. That's the way to look at it.
I understand the political game behind all this. The openness that Mr. Turnbull has shown in proposing an amendment to the motion means that we are once again demonstrating that we have the opportunity to move forward and to address the other issues that we would like to address. As I was explaining, prorogation made it possible for the government to take a step back, to set priorities for Canadians in relation to the COVID-19 pandemic, but also to set priorities for the economic recovery. I talked about the seniors who suffered greatly because of COVID-19, the schools and the parents who were stuck at home with their children, but I am thinking especially of our merchants and our small businesses. The more rural your environment was, the more isolated you were and the more you were affected.
Again, we cannot save every business and every small business, but we have done everything we can, and we are doing it again today by announcing the extension of the assistance available to businesses. This can greatly help businesses in my riding and in my colleagues' ridings. During the prorogation, we reflected on this. Today, we need to put things into perspective and adopt Mr. Turnbull's amendment.
Now there are two possibilities. The first is that we can vote in favour of the amendment, which would allow us to move forward and demonstrate that we are working as a team. The second is that we can vote against the amendment, which would allow us to open the debate and propose even more robust changes. As a member of Parliament, I am prepared to debate for as long as it takes. If we have to debate until an election is called, we will do so. We will not tolerate this situation. I am prepared to roll up my sleeves, to work hard, to prepare accordingly and to debate for as long as it takes.
It is important to understand how important December 10 was. The witnesses appeared before several committees, and the government heard all the answers. We heard a whole range of evidence in this study. In addition, testified on behalf of the government.
Now we absolutely must move on to another issue.
I talked to you about prorogation, but I want to quote Ms. Barbara Messamore from the University of the Fraser Valley, who came and talked to us about prorogation on December 10. Things have changed a lot since then. Here's what she said:
[...] there is also a strong case that can be made that the unforeseen eruption of the COVID-19 crisis since the start of the 43rd Parliament provides a rationale for a new session, with a new Speech from the Throne setting out a fresh legislative program. For this reason, I think prorogation was entirely justifiable.
Today, we are being criticized for not having prorogued Parliament earlier. Let's think about everything that has happened since then. We have done a lot to adapt and to help the population. I am thinking of all the bills we have passed. Today, the distribution of vaccines alone could justify a prorogation so that we can step back and prepare for a good recovery, but we have already done that. There was no right or wrong time to prorogue Parliament. The Prime Minister did it during the pandemic, and Ms. Barbara Messamore told us that it was totally justified to do so.
Despite all the evidence to the contrary, at every meeting since December 10, opposition members have been saying that the only reason Parliament was prorogued was because of the WE Charity case. Despite everything that has been said at the Standing Committee on Access to Information, Privacy and Ethics, the Standing Committee on Finance and everywhere else, they are unable to admit that they are wrong.
Our citizens are not talking about a scandal surrounding WE Charity or the reasons behind the prorogation. My colleagues have talked about that in their speeches. Mr. Turnbull clearly stated that his constituents had never questioned him about the reasons behind prorogation and WE Charity. That is not what our citizens are talking about. Mr. Turnbull has tabled an amendment that I would not even have tabled myself, but I am prepared to support it and say that it is very valid. It shows goodwill on his part.
Now, no matter how many times the opposition parties have heard it, I do not mind repeating it: nothing is going to change their opinion, because they are trying to fabricate a scandal surrounding WE Charity through the Standing Committee on Procedure and House Affairs. As good parliamentarians, we will never accept that. They had a preconceived idea from the start. I do not understand the relevance of summoning the Prime Minister, political staff and dedicated citizens who have tried to help people when opposition members have already formed their opinion on this. It is unfair. It is not right to summon these people with the ultimate aim of trapping them in a political war.
I do not mind recalling the reasons for prorogation. They were set out in the report on the subject. Indeed, the COVID-19 pandemic led to the tabling of a document of some 40 pages, including annexes, which talks about the prorogation that took place in August 2020.
If you haven't read the 's report, I invite you to do so. It's about forty pages long and well explained. The Prime Minister did not have to justify himself, but he took the time to come and testify before he was even asked. His testimony is simple. He explained line by line the reason for prorogation. He wanted to give decision makers, civil servants and senior officials some time to let the dust settle a bit. This way, they could be better, come up with better solutions and avoid mistakes.
We make mistakes when we go too fast. This happens with our staff, but also with our colleagues. It is often just one irrelevant word in a sentence that could be corrected, but is already considered a mistake. It's a fine line. Imagine being a big decision maker and having to quickly implement policies that affect millions of Canadians, that go directly into their pockets.
My father always told me to be careful in life. He said that if you want to hurt someone, you go for their family or their money. But the pandemic has affected both. It's affected taxpayers' pockets, our seniors' grocery baskets, budgets spent on expensive deliveries, the businesses of workers who could no longer get to work. Indirectly, it's affected families who were isolated, families who suffered loss or illness.
A personal friend of mine—a young man in his forties—has contracted COVID-19 and has not yet recovered. Week after week, he is tired and he struggles. Months after getting sick, he has not fully recovered. This virus has left its mark. This friend is an elementary school principal under pressure to manage staff and students and to control everything. For instance, if a child has a bit of a runny nose, he must call the parents. He has to manage all this while being personally affected by COVID-19 and struggling to get through his work weeks without feeling the fatigue caused by COVID-19. Imagine how much this can affect families.
This is real, this is what is happening on the ground. We absolutely must be able to come up with a motion that will be accepted by everyone.
We will have to leave soon for votes in the House. However, I don't know what the procedure is.
[English]
Madam Chair, about the vote, I don't want to go too fast. I didn't read anything, but what about the vote?
Can you tell me if we have a vote at three o'clock?
:
Thank you, Madam Chair.
I will say that I think it's important... Obviously the amendment is relevant to the motion and so on and so forth. Right now, for clarity, we are talking about Mr. Turnbull's amendment.
That being said, it's important to understand, as Canadians—because I know Canadians are watching this—what Ms. Vecchio's motion was, which Mr. Turnbull suggested the amendment to, so that we're clear on that.
If everybody can sit back and indulge me, I want to revisit Ms. Vecchio's motion. I think I'm certainly allowed to do that because of the amendment to the motion. I think they go hand in hand, for what it's worth. I'm going to read this out:
That, in respect of the Committee’s study of the government’s reasons for the prorogation of Parliament in August 2020, the Committee
(a) renew the invitation issued to the Prime Minister to appear before the committee, provided that if he does not agree, within one week of the adoption of this motion, to appear for at least three hours, the Chair shall be instructed to report to the House forthwith a recommendation that this committee be empowered to order his appearance from time to time;
That's (a). That's the of Canada.
(b) renew the invitations issued to the Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of Finance and the Minister of Diversity and Inclusion and Youth, each to appear separately before the committee, provided that in respect of each of them who does not agree, within one week of the adoption of this motion, to appear for at least 90 minutes each, the Chair shall be instructed to report to the House forthwith a recommendation that this committee be empowered to order her appearance from time to time;
(c) renew the invitations issued to the Honourable Bill Morneau, Katie Telford, Craig Kielburger and Marc Kielburger, each to appear separately before the committee, provided that in respect of each of them who does not agree, within one week of the adoption of this motion, to appear for at least three hours each, a summons do issue for his or her appearance before the Committee at a date and time determined by the Chair but no later than one month following the adoption of this motion;
Madam Chair, I think I also bring a unique perspective to this. I've been lucky enough to substitute in on ethics too, where the Kielburger brothers have testified again.
What screams at me, Madam Chair, is that the opposition is not getting the answers that they want. It's not the answers that Canadians want. It's not the answers that Canadians care about, that's for sure. They're not getting the answers that they want.
I'm going to have a lot to say about the Kielburger brothers and their testimony also at ethics, but I'm going to continue here.
(d) renew the invitations issued to Farah Perelmuter and Martin Perelmuter, to appear before the committee, provided that if they do not agree, within one week of the adoption of this motion, to appear for at least 90 minutes, a summons do issue for their appearance before the Committee at a date and time determined by the Chair but no later than one month following the adoption of this motion;
(e) issue an order for the production of all memoranda, e-mails, text messages, documents, notes or other records from the Prime Minister’s Office and the Privy Council Office, since June 25, 2020, concerning options, plans and preparations for the prorogation of Parliament, including polling and public opinion research used to inform the decision to prorogue Parliament, provided that these documents shall be provided to the clerk of the committee within two weeks of the adoption of this motion;
(f) issue an order for the production of records of all communications between the government and any of WE Charity (or its affiliated organizations), Craig Kielburger, Marc Kielburger, or Speakers' Spotlight, since June 25, 2020, in respect of the prorogation of Parliament, provided that these documents shall be provided to the clerk of the committee within two weeks of the adoption of this motion;
(g) issue orders to WE Charity (including its affiliated organizations), Craig Kielburger, Marc Kielburger and Speakers' Spotlight for the production of all memoranda, e-mails, text messages, documents, notes or other records, since June 25, 2020, concerning the prorogation of Parliament, provided that these documents shall be provided to the clerk of the committee within two weeks of the adoption of this motion; and
(h) all documents provided to the clerk of the committee in respect of paragraphs (e) to (g) shall be published on the committee's website as soon as practical upon receipt, once they are available in both official languages.
Now, Madam Chair, this is what the opposition is expecting this committee to move forward with. How much more can possibly be pulled out of the Kielburgers or Perelmuters that hasn't already been flushed out and talked about?
I saw the motion by MP Vecchio. Obviously, we have the amendment. This is what we're talking about now. MP Turnbull, I know, gave a lot of thought to this. He's a great MP. I called him a rookie MP, but he's not a rookie anymore. His dedication, his preparedness and the way he articulates his points are really to be commended. They really are. We are lucky as parliamentarians to have somebody like MP Turnbull join us. He certainly adds to all of us.
He put forth an amendment:
I. by deleting paragraph (a),
II. by replacing paragraph (b) with the following: “(b) renew the invitations issued to the Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of Finance and the Minister of Diversity and Inclusion and Youth, each to appear separately before the committee for at least 90 minutes; and”
III. by replacing paragraph (c) with the following: “(b) renew the invitations issued to the Honourable Bill Morneau, Craig Kielburger and Marc Kielburger, each to appear separately before the committee for at least 90 minutes.", and
IV. by deleting paragraphs (d) to (h).
It looks reasonable. This is his amendment but, no, it's not good enough. It's frustrating to me, I'll be honest, when I know that each and every one of us on this committee and each and every one of us in Parliament, in the House, is elected to serve our constituents. Sure, we have differences in ideologies; that's what it is. I have a certain belief. Conservatives have certain ideologies, as do NDP or Green Party or Bloc members or independents, and what have you.
I believe government can do good things. Government is there to undertake initiatives and support people who need help. Good government can bring forth transformational programs, such as the Canada child benefit, which is an incredible program.
There is also the old age pension, the GIS and the Canada housing benefit, which my province unfortunately hasn't picked up yet. It's another bone of contention I have. Hopefully my province will pick it up.
Why are we here? We're elected to serve our constituents, and I'm passionate about that. This motion isn't serving our constituents. There's no one on this committee from any party whose phone is ringing off the hook about prorogation and the reasons we prorogued. We've talked about that before. Some members say, “They prorogued to avoid this, and they did that”, forgetting what the Harper government did with respect to proroguing. I'm disappointed, and I'm a part of it too. I'm disappointed that we can't move on, we can't move forward and we can't work together on things that Canadians care about.
What has my phone been ringing about in my constituency office today? It is Bill , the Supreme Court ruling and reaffirming of the federal right to move forward with a price on pollution. We certainly saw Conservative premiers across the country resist and challenge this, and I was certainly thrilled that my premier, Premier Higgs, pulled out of the lawsuit. It was probably a year ago. He basically said that he was not going to go down a road that wastes his time. That's what my constituents care about.
I don't want to take up too much of the committee's time today, but last night I gave the amendment a lot of thought. I gave a lot of thought to the meeting too. I knew I would be talking. I'm certainly never at a loss for words, but I wanted to try to articulate what I really feel with respect to MP Turnbull's proposed amendment to MP Vecchio's motion.
I have a number of thoughts that I thought would be relevant and that needed to be shared with my colleagues on this committee and with Canadians with respect to my support for Mr. Turnbull's amendment. I know he has given it a lot of thought. I'm jealous because he's eating his lunch right now and I'm not. I don't know if that's popcorn he has there, but hopefully he is enjoying his lunch.
First of all, I want colleagues to think of the precedents they are setting with some of the stunts they've been pulling with regard to the calling of witnesses and requesting documents. I won't read it again so don't worry, but when I read through MP Vecchio's motion, I can't believe the depth of the people and documents they want. There's no end to it. There is no end to this, and again, I implore the opposition to see that Canadians have moved on. Canadians have made judgments.
It's time to move on. It's time to move forward.
When you're in opposition, you're always looking for new and creative ways to try to hold government to account. That's what Her Majesty's loyal opposition is supposed to do. That works on both sides.
I wasn't around before 2015, obviously. I was very busy running a hockey team, for those of you who don't know. MP Blaikie knows. It was the Saint John Sea Dogs, which is certainly one of the most successful major junior organizations in the country. Yes, MP Lauzon, they're more successful than the Gatineau Olympiques. I take that back. Maybe they're not quite as successful as the Olympiques. We've only been in the league for a very limited number of years.
I know the opposition's job is to hold us to account. I applaud you. I give you credit. You have held us to account. That's how Parliament is supposed to work. The NDP, the Bloc, the Conservative Party and the Green Party are there to hold us to account. You did a good job doing it.
You did your job and you held us to account. You beat us up here, you did this, you did that and now you're going to move on. You're going to now be seized with governing and helping to govern. You do that, Madam Chair, by working together across the aisle and being bipartisan. You work on legislation and policies to better Canadians' lives. That's why we're here.
For those watching at home, from time to time we all use parliamentary procedure or all the tools in the tool box to challenge the government of the day. Just be transparent. We did it too in opposition. It's how Parliament works. It's acceptable and it's something that has been done since the advent of the Westminster parliamentary model. However, as with everything in our line of work, Madam Chair, there are boundaries.
What has been true, at least until 2020, is that prime ministers only testify before committees in rare and exceptional circumstances. In a sign of openness, transparency and to answer pertinent [Technical difficulty—Editor] appeared before FINA back in August of 2020. Before that time, a PM only spoke in committee in a handful of circumstances.
I find concerning that this debate we are now having in regard to inviting the to this committee, and everybody else—anyone who ever drove by the House of Commons it seems at times.... Frankly, if the members opposite really did want the Prime Minister here to speak about prorogation, there would at least be a small amount of relevance to that request.
Not long ago, we heard from the Leader of the Government in the House of Commons that there was some relevance to his appearance. It made sense to hear from him in regard to the prorogation study. provided the government's reasoning and decision on behalf of the and cabinet, as well all other matters that come before this committee in regard to government policy. We heard from the relevant minister as part of the testimony on this subject.
How many other times has the Prime Minister appeared before this committee to testify on a matter that falls into the wheelhouse of House operations or matters pertaining to the Privy Council Office?
The answer is easy. He hasn't.
Let's lay it on the table for each other here today, Madam Chair. Opposition colleagues want to call the Prime Minister here today to talk about WE Charity matters. We all know that is what they're trying to get at, and we all know why they are making it in this prorogation study. Relevance is an issue.
They have tried this at several other committees, tried to tangentially connect WE to all facets of government operations in the COVID-19 response. Obviously I'm tuned in, Madam Chair. I was asked to sit in on the ethics committee a few times, and it was great to be back at the ethics committee. I sat on the ethics committee in the previous Parliament with people like and . Blaine Calkins, I believe, was the chair.
I was surprised to see an opposition member in the chair of ethics. I was not aware it worked that way, but I sat on ethics and saw the Perelmuters with respect to Speakers' Spotlight and heard testimony in ethics that really made me sad about how their lives had been literally shattered and their organization shattered, all in the pursuit of trying to find an answer—not the truth, not an answer that satisfied—an answer the opposition wanted, and they wouldn't stop. There were threats against these people and their staff. For what? What was the end here?
I saw with respect to ethics, literally.... I'll be blunt: the committee, I thought, was almost turned into a circus. The finance committee had heard from the Kielburger brothers for four hours. This meeting was remarkable inasmuch as, for all the hype and accusations that were made by the opposition, at the end of the day, all the questions put forth were answered, and documents were requested, which they agreed to provide to the committee.
The Kielburgers were at the committee for hours. Ask yourself this; ask all of us this: What new did we learn, really? For the opposition now, Madam Chair, and the prorogation, let's kind of wrap in the WE; let's throw this altogether. Let's cast this net. Let's cast this net out as far as we can throw it, and let's see what we can reel in.
I'll be blunt. What surprises me is that there is nothing new, but yet we're still looking for answers to questions. Last week there was really still nothing, yet now we're still going to put a motion out there that we want to get them back to testify again. We want to compel them to come before us, Madam Chair. We want documents, and we want this, and we want that.
I sometimes try to put myself out there, Madam Chair, just objectively. I step away. I'm a very proud Liberal, of course. I love the programs and policies that we stand for in the government that we give Canadians. Sometimes I try to step back. I'm going to be objective. I'm not going to put my Liberal hat on. For the life of me, I can't see why the opposition continues down this road. I know I can't ask for a raising of hands here, but there are no phones ringing in any office about prorogation.
I see Mr. Calkins has joined us. I just talked about Mr. Calkins as chair of ethics. I look up, and lo and behold, there he is. He has actually joined the committee. I don't know if that was some magical little thing I did to compel him to come on, but there he is with his hunting trophies behind him.
I hope things are all well Blaine. It's good to see you. You did a good job as chair of ethics when I was there. I learned a lot. You were fair. You were balanced. We had some fun. We did a lot of great work too. It is good to see you, even though you're in another part of the country. We're probably a four-hour time change. I'm not even sure about that, to be honest.
I believe it's time to move forward. Mr. Turnbull's amendment is doing that. It's saying that if you want to hear a little bit more, and if you want to flush out a little more information from here or there, okay, we'll give you that, even though we probably....I know Mr. Lauzon actually talked about this too, with respect to Mr. Turnbull's amendment. When I first read it, I was surprised that Mr. Turnbull was....We're meeting halfway here.
That might be the wrong analogy in the political world, but we're meeting here. We're moving forth with something that you should take. You should vote on this. You should support it. We can move on and get on to things. It seems very reasonable to me.
In fact, when I first read it I was like, “Oh my. Oh my. This, even more than I thought, Mr. Turnbull may want”, but it's a reasonable amendment. Yet, here we are.
I'm disappointed that the prorogation....That was talked out, and debated in committee very well on both sides. The opposition members have a job to do, and they put forth their thoughts, and why they wanted to go this way. We certainly were quick to remind them about Prime Minister Harper, and how he prorogued to avoid a vote. I guess that was irrelevant then. We debated that through. There were points on both sides.
It's the WE thing. Let's get that WE thing back, because we haven't yet got the answers we want.
Yes, we've talked about it in ethics and finance, and we're trying to get it in every little nook and cranny we can, but we still haven't got what we want. Not what Canadians wanted, or what's relevant to Canadians, we haven't got what we wanted, pardon the pun on WE.
Colleagues on the other side will try to say that this isn't the case with WE, yet all one has to do is look at the witnesses they are calling and it becomes very obvious. The , let's get the Prime Minister in here; let's get Katie Telford,. All appeared before the finance committee, and in the case of Minister Chagger and Ms. Telford, provided over two hours worth of testimony. The Prime Minister took questions for an hour and a half. I watched Ms. Telford's testimony, how much more open and transparent could somebody be? You asked, she answered, but no, that wasn't good enough, we want more.
Throughout questioning time and time again, theories advanced by opposition colleagues were discounted and thoroughly shut down. tried a gotcha moment on the ; it fell flat. tried with Ms. Telford; he fell flatter. Why is that? Because there was and is nothing there. This ridiculous theory that the Prime Minister and his family were personally invested in the decision to marshal a federal program to the WE Charity is absurd, and has been particularly disproved.
I remember, and I think I alluded to this the last time I spoke, that the opposition obviously wants to get that gotcha moment, they want that clip, that five o'clock news story, and there's nothing there. How long has this been going on? Again, I'm lucky to have my office in a mall—Market Square—and I told you this last time, colleagues, if I walked out that door today and asked the first 100 people who walked by me on a scale of one to 10 where they would prioritize this committee, the Conservative Party trying to compel the and the about prorogation and WE, I'm telling you it would be a zero. They've moved on, they're concerned about getting vaccines in their arms, where we're doing an amazing job. They're concerned about benefits, whether the wage subsidy is going to be extended, whether the recovery benefit, the sickness benefit are going to be there for them.
I'm proud, too, as a government. We're shifting now—you can see it—from support to recovery, and we're focused on doing the right things to make industries recover, help Canadians recover so we can move forward past this. Yet what are we doing? We're sitting here. The Conservative Party, the opposition party, wants us to get all these witnesses back in to talk about proroguing.
Time and time again, from finance committee to ethics to government operations, multiple attempts were made to try to keep the WE matter alive in the eyes of Canadians and media. However, no one was buying what the Conservatives and their opposition allies were selling.
Frankly, Madam Chair, Canadians know better. They saw this cheap political stunt for what it was and promptly moved on. They wanted a government that is serious and focused on them. If people are watching, we should be focused on you, what you're concerned about, what you need to get through the week, the month, the next six months.
Yet, here we are. Here we all are. I'm just a sub. I'm happy to sub, but I'm just a sub-in here, probably a pinch-hitter, doing my best. Here we are staring down what is the last-ditch effort of a desperate opposition trying to keep the non-story alive.
Look, you want a little free advice? I have some thoughts.
I don't believe that it's helping you. I don't believe that there's a massive movement of public opinion behind you. I don't believe that it benefits you. You can say, “Well, it's Wayne Long in Saint John—Rothesay. Of course, it's benefiting us. Of course, it's going to help our Conservative Party. It's going to make Canadians want to vote for us, if and when there's an election in the next..”. Well, we certainly know there's going to be one in the next...what, three years or two and a half years, whatever it is?
However, my advice to you, my colleagues on the other side, would be to move on. Spend your time focused on coming up with policies and a vision for Canada, something that Canadians can look at and say, “You know, I like that vision. I like what they're offering.” That's what makes politics fun and that's how politics should work. It's not this....
Let me be abundantly clear, Madam Chair. This motion before us today is nothing but a cheap political stunt aimed at breaking the last remaining boundaries of the decorum we have left. The Conservatives and other opposition parties have taken the cue of some other politicians and are willing to completely disconnect from reality and say whatever is necessary to achieve their goal of attaining power. Frankly, I believe it is completely unacceptable. It's unbecoming of this place.
I'm proud of the work I do, proud of the work that we all do. However, I think we need to reflect, to really step back.... I don't want to see a show of hands, but I think that Mr. Turnbull's amendment should be supported. Think about it. It's reasonable. I know MP Turnbull put a lot of work into that amendment—a lot of work and a lot of time. It's just one man's opinion, but I think it should be supported.
As it's been said over and over again, let's.... I know MP Duncan talked about this when she spoke the other day, and she spoke quite passionately to it: We are in the midst of an international pandemic, and we are seized with, and should all be seized with, running this country and being there for Canadians. It's not too late, even for a guy like me, to learn this.
If I've ever seen value in a strong government, it's now. I am so thankful that we have been able to answer the bell to be there for Canadians. I think we've all been changed by it. We've all been challenged by it. It has certainly made me a different person. I'm more thankful, more reflective and more appreciative. I now understand the incredible challenges that we all face as parliamentarians and as government in being there for our constituents and our citizens.
I'll never forget—and I know I echoed this before—coming home over a year ago now, which is crazy, and not knowing what to expect, not knowing what was in front of us. I walked into a mall that was basically shut down. I had to call security to get into my constituency office. I remember the calls I got from Canadians who worried about where they were going to get support to buy groceries for their kids and to pay their rents. They had the legs cut out from underneath them, and we were there.
We're seized with a pandemic, and Canadians want us to act aggressively yet responsibly. Do we see light at the end of the tunnel with respect to it? Yes, there is light. I believe in my heart that we're in a race now against variants and with respect to the vaccine, but there are better days ahead. There are brighter days ahead for all of us. That's what we should be concerned about.
By August 2020, with restrictions loosened and some normalcy returning to the country, we took stock and realized that the road map that had been set out was not even close. Therefore, a reset was needed to ensure that the whole country was ready and prepared for the impending second wave and the economic recovery.
For us, we needed to prorogue. We needed to step back, assess and reboot. Prorogation is a parliamentary tool, at the disposal of the government of the day, to wipe the slate clean and refocus the governmental agenda. No one, not even my colleagues on the other side, can argue that the previous throne speech was no longer relevant. A new plan was needed. We had to come forth with a new plan. However, colleagues would rather see the ghost of the WE Charity around every corner and are doing everything possible to tie these two issues together.
Madam Chair, do you mind if I get a drink of water?
I'm not sure where my opposition colleagues are looking to go with this motion by having these witnesses come before us and provide the same testimony they have already given elsewhere, which can be read into the record here, other than to put on a political show. We've heard from these people. How much more do we expect? Perelmuters, Kielburgers, Katie Telford—what more do you want them to say?
It's not what they've said—well, I guess technically it is what they've said—it's the fact that it's not what the opposition wants to hear. That's what this is really about, isn't it? They're not getting the answers they want, so they want to continue on. They want to see if they can find something else.
The truth is the opposition have already made up their mind on the issue of the prorogation and the WE Charity matter. They've repeatedly been presented with evidence to the contrary of their theories on the matter, and yet they continue to look for ways to make the narrative true. Madam Chair, this is one man musing.
Unless the opposition party polling is telling them that Canadians want more on WE—and indeed if that's what they're getting from their polling, I'd suggest they talk to their pollsters or ask their pollsters who they are actually polling. [Technical difficulty—Editor] I don't see it. I'm not saying that, Chair, to be a smart guy or to say “ha ha ha”. I don't see it, and Canadians don't see it.
This committee shouldn't be used as the opposition's kangaroo court. That's not what this is for. This committee should be seized with much more important matters, Madam Chair. This committee does not exist to serve narrow political interests. This is not a court of law. We are not Crown prosecutors. The public does not believe that Her Majesty's loyal opposition is looking at this issue for the public good.
Canadians realize that the point of this motion is to advance the political interests of the Conservative Party and the other opposition parties. I know everybody's keenly interested here. I can tell by looking at the screens. I can tell people are extremely interested, especially my colleague MP Drouin, who's listening with bated breath to everything I say.
This will be the third time I've asked this question to the committee. Ask yourself this: Has anybody's phone rung over the last week with respect to prorogation or WE? Be honest with yourselves. Obviously you don't have to show your hand.
Why should witnesses have to come before us at all if the opposition has already determined the outcome of the testimony?
The testimony we've heard before this committee in regard to this study has been clear. Public servants, politicians and constitutional experts alike are all in agreement that the power to prorogue Parliament rests solely with the Prime Minister. It's an inherently political decision. There is nothing wrong with that, because governments are elected based on their political leanings. Their agendas themselves are political in nature. It makes complete sense, then, that resetting the government agenda would be a political decision.
I apologize for being loose with the date and time, but I remember when Stephen Harper prorogued. I was travelling with the Sea Dogs at that point. I know I referenced this before. I remember watching The National or CTV News that night. I don't know if MP Kent was actually reading the news at that point. He might have been. Nonetheless, I remember watching and looking at Prime Minister Harper. People were really upset that he did it to avoid a confidence vote. That wasn't the case. It was just a reset. Times have changed. But yet here we are.
The opposition party wants this investigated more and more. Let's get the Kielburgers in. Let's get everybody else in. Let's throw the kitchen sink in there too. Let's stir the pot all around. Let's get a big brew going here and see what we can find.
I mean, the previous Conservative government prorogued for weeks. They cited extraordinary times due to the 2008 economic crisis. In many ways, late 2020 was much worse than the situation the Conservatives faced in 2008. The government was faced with both an international pandemic of mass proportions and sizable economic issues. This was not the time to produce a governing blueprint overnight. The government took its time to consult and ensure that the right approach was taken on behalf of all Canadians. That's what good, responsible government should do.
We needed to step back. We needed to reassess. We needed to take account of everything that was happening around us. The well-being of Canadians has always been the number one priority of this government and always will be throughout its time in office, and especially during this unprecedented pandemic. I will tell you that all of us are privileged to have the support of our constituents. All of us are privileged to be members of Parliament. I will certainly look back at this time, as a member of Parliament, not with fondness but with pride at the response our government gave at one of the country's darkest, most challenging times.
I mean, think about the fact that we were literally writing and turning pages before the ink was dry. The odd Conservative critic in my riding would be, “Oh, these programs are poorly thought out.” Poorly thought out—are you kidding me? We were rolling out these programs within weeks, not years.
I'll look back with a lot of pride. We don't need political stunts rights now. It is very clear that there is no need whatsoever for the witnesses requested to appear.
The , Ms. Telford and all have testimony on file. They have already testified. It's already in the record. Our clerk could easily make the request to FINA for that testimony.
Frankly, I'm not even sure why is on the list or what she has to do with the prorogation debate. Can someone tell me that? While the minister plays a key and central role to the management of government, she is not the prime minister and would not have played a role in deciding to exercise prorogation.
I read MP Vecchio's motion and while reading it I thought, “Oh my lord, it would compel this, we want this, we want that, we want him, we want her....” To what end?
Mr. Turnbull's amendment is extremely reasonable and well-thought-out.
What Canadians need going forward is for parliamentarians to focus on the task at hand. The economic recovery that we have before us is going to be the most important since the Second World War. Canadians do not have time for narrow and cheap political games. We need to shift to recovery. We were there for support and now we need to shift to recovery. That's where our focus should be.
Colleagues have said time and time again that they are willing to join the team Canada approach to rebuilding our economy post-pandemic. Here we are ready to extend a hand and ask them to join us to work together toward that end.
I want to finish up with an appeal to whoever is watching this. Let's work together. Let's call a spade a spade. Testimonies have occurred in other committees. Tough questions have been asked. Difficult questions have been asked. I respect that. I respect that people needed to come before certain committees to testify. I totally respected that, supported it, in fact. They testified and it's on the record. Transcripts can be given to this committee.
I will close with this. I thank the committee for the work we do. I know you are all good MPs. I have an abundance of respect for all of you. I know you care deeply about your ridings, Canadians, the country. I know we stood together on many things and many votes, especially with respect to supporting Canadians.
I know we did the right things when we had to. We put partisanship aside. This is my appeal to you. I ask you sincerely to support the amendment to the motion. Please support the amendment. We meet you more than halfway.
Madam Chair, thank you for letting me say a few words. I respect you very much. You do a great job, Ruby, a fantastic job as chair of this committee. I know it's not easy. I thank you for what you're doing. Certainly on behalf of my riding of Saint John—Rothesay, I thank you. I'll leave it at that.
:
Thank you so much, Madam Chair.
We must value our seniors. We must value their wisdom, knowledge and talents, and address the challenges they face in society.
To protect jobs and livelihoods, our government put in place strong measures to protect businesses and workers. We had to do this because the virus could only be slowed or stopped by limiting social contacts. This meant reducing economic activity. It meant shutting down workplaces and later limiting the number of people restaurants serve. It meant asking people to stay home from work if they were sick or their children were sick. It simply would have been unfair to ask businesses to shut down and workers to stay home without compensating them for lost income.
Within one week of shutting down the country last March, our government announced a stimulus package, which included $27 billion in emergency aid for workers and businesses and $55 billion in tax deferrals. We injected billions of dollars into businesses to help with their cash flow and to keep workers on the payroll, while bolstering federal benefits and support programs for people who had lost their jobs.
This money really matters to our communities. Those funds helped Canadians pay for rent and groceries, and they helped businesses continue to pay their employees and their bills.
Our government created CERB, which helped more than eight million workers. We call our Etobicoke North community daily to hear how our families are doing, what additional help they need. We hear right across the board that CERB was a lifeline, which allowed people to pay for rent, groceries and transportation.
Our government put in place the Canada emergency wage subsidy, which supported three million Canadian workers to stay on the payroll.
Our local businesses are at the heart of our communities. They are our friends and neighbours. We can support them by ordering takeout from the restaurant down the street, shopping at the store around the corner or ordering online. These economic programs we have put in place are good reasons to hear directly from the .
Our government also understood that parents were worried about the costs of raising our children. That's why we invested in families. For the year 2021, we increased the Canada child benefit to a maximum of $6,765 per child under six years of age and $5,708 per child age six to 17. Later on, we invested $625 million in emergency federal support to ensure that safe, sufficient and affordable child care was available.
Our government understood that additional support was needed for local food banks and organizations. Without that support, COVID-19 would have had additional impacts on vulnerable communities. We know that many Canadians rely on food banks and local food organizations to feed their families and find support in hard times.
In our Etobicoke North community, I would like to thank the Salvation Army, the International Muslim Organization of Toronto and Mount Olive Church for the work they do to provide healthy and nutritious food to our families.
Our government understood that young Canadians were facing unprecedented challenges, so we doubled the Canada student service grant and created the Canada emergency student benefit. We wanted to ensure that students had the help they needed to continue their studies.
My own research area was pandemics and helping governments, industry, businesses and organizations prepare for a possible pandemic. In Etobicoke North, parents and teachers told me their concerns about their children heading back to school. As a former educator, I understood and that's why I pushed so hard for our government to invest $2 billion in the safe return to class fund in support of provinces and territories.
Our government was committed to protecting students and staff from the challenges of COVID-19. Learning is different this year. The school year has been difficult for many Canadians, including teachers, students and parents. Let me just say thank you to our educators for teaching during difficult times and inspiring the next generation.
Let me also acknowledge our children and young people. One year is a long time in their lives. One year for a five-year-old is 20% of their life, and for a 15-year-old is 7% of their life. We have asked so much of children.
Our students work so hard. Let's remember that all children are born curious. They innately discover, explore and ask questions and it's the job of all of us to inspire them, to encourage them, to reach for the stars and to make sure that every child has a place to shine. All these programs are good reasons we should hear from the .
I also fought very hard for a $1-billion investment in a national medical and research strategy to address COVID-19, because science and public health are key to fighting COVID-19, research for vaccines and treatment, support for clinical trials and expanded testing and modelling, but research matters beyond the pandemic. Research is a fundamental building block of our country that requires attention, nurture and support for a better future, environment and quality of life for all.
Hearing about investments in science and research would be another good reason to hear from our . The Deputy Prime Minister understood that the best economic approach was to stop the spread of COVID-19, and until that was possible through a vaccine, the next best approach is to help Canadians, businesses and our families weather the pandemic without losing their livelihoods and without going broke.
Vaccine equity would be another good reason to hear from our . Vaccines are necessary to help the world move from locking down societies to locking down the virus. More transmission means more variants. The more variants that emerge, the more likely it is that they will evade vaccines. As long as the virus continues to circulate, people will continue to die, trade and travel will continue to be disrupted and the economic recovery will be further delayed.
The global vaccination campaign represents the greatest moral test of our times. The many low-income countries [Technical difficulty—Editor]. I know Canada has agreed to top up its funding for vaccine rollouts in lower-income countries, pledging $75 million more to the COVAX international vaccine-sharing program. That new pledge brings Canada's total contribution to $940 million. It would be good to get the 's thoughts on how the world needs to unite to produce and distribute sufficient vaccines for all, which means at least doubling manufacturing capacity around the world. This really matters.
The inequitable distribution of vaccines is a moral outrage. It makes no sense for stopping the spread of the disease and it's economically self-defeating.
Only together can we end this pandemic and recover. Only together can we revive our economies. We know that our eventual recovery will be faster and more complete in direct proportion to how much we limit the economic damage caused by the coronavirus. According to the World Bank, the pandemic pushed 124 million people into extreme poverty in 2020. The Economist estimates that two years of COVID-19 will create a downturn twice as deep as the Great Recession.
Hearing about the economic recovery would be another important reason to hear from the . We entered this crisis with significant fiscal firepower. When COVID-19 hit, Canada had the lowest net debt-to-GDP ratio in the G7. I'd like [Technical difficulty—Editor] what investments will help our economy come back stronger than before. How are we going to lay a foundation for a green economy, an innovation economy and a fair economy that supports good jobs for all Canadians? We want to emerge from the pandemic healthier, wealthier and greener.
:
Thank you very much, Madam Chair.
I suppose the question before us is whether Mr. Turnbull's amendment is going to be adequate to the task of finding a way we can proceed.
I just want to recall why it is that we're here in terms of the study of prorogation. As I've said before, you have to go back past this latest prorogation to understand why we're here. You have to go back to the prorogation of under his tenure. There were two of them, I believe, that were controversial, although for different reasons.
I think an important question is raised about the political abuse of prorogation, what exactly that means, how it's done and how we can try to prevent abuses of prorogation in the future.
The 's proposal on how to do that was to have the government table reasons for its prorogation and to have those forwarded to PROC, presumably for study, so here we are.
I think I've also been clear elsewhere on the record, but just in case I haven't, let me say that I don't think it's an adequate policy. I think that the best way to prevent political abuses of prorogation—which is by no means foolproof, but nevertheless better than what we have—would be to mandate a vote in the House of Commons prior to a prorogation. Then these debates that we've had about the advisability of the latest prorogation would happen in advance of it. A deliberative body would make the decision rather than leaving the decision to one person acting alone, so there's that.
We're doing this study because of the 's own initiative in proposing a solution for the political abuses of prorogation in the aftermath of the controversial Harper prorogation. Then, of course, the Prime Minister didn't prorogue Parliament at all in the four years of the majority government. I think, if he did, we could have established a pretty routine mechanism for dealing with this and perhaps set some good precedents for how the Prime Minister's own policy would work in a less controversial and less heated scenario. These kinds of intense political disagreements typically make for bad policy and bad procedure. It's why it's better to lay those things out clearly beforehand.
We've heard a lot of different things. I think it's interesting that the debate has brought out the virtue of long debate, something that I hope members will remember for majority Parliaments when they might have the votes they need in order to summarily end debate, as we've seen in Parliaments of the past.
I think it's interesting. We've heard just today Mr. Long saying that the main motion is ridiculous because it invites the , and she has nothing to do with it. It's the decision of the alone, so why would we invite her?
Then we just heard a long argument by Ms. Duncan about why it makes a lot of sense to have the here. It's a salutary feature of the motion that it calls for the Deputy Prime Minister. Maybe those arguments were rehearsed on the last day, I don't know.
That disagreement on the Liberal bench between the advisability of inviting the or not was new information to me. Had the debate ended early, we wouldn't have been graced with that insight into the diversity of opinion on the Liberal bench. I take that as an interesting development in today's meeting.
What I want to say is that we've heard a lot of different kinds of arguments from our Liberal colleagues about the nature of this motion and what we're here to do. They're very quick to say that it's political. I would say that I have, on a number of occasions at this committee and elsewhere, offered the view that, “Look, if this is just political, if this is really about digging into the details of the latest prorogation then, yes, I do think that the WE Charity scandal had a lot to do with the latest prorogation”. I don't think it was innocent.
Having been one of the New Democrats who negotiated the Canadian emergency student benefit, the government was quite reticent to offer a benefit at all to students. Members will know that it was ultimately offered at a reduced rate.
One of the justifications the government gave for paying students less income support than everybody else, despite the fact that they needed to eat and they needed to have a roof over their heads like everybody else, was that they had a fantastic program for student employment during the summer that went above and beyond the Canada summer jobs program. That became the WE Charity scandal. This meant, because the program didn't move forward, students had a reduced rate of income support during the summer and beyond, without having the job program that was supposed to help them make up that difference.
When we talk about whether the opposition is just focusing on issues that don't have a human impact versus the kinds of substantial things that Liberals say they want to be talking about, I would argue that the WE Charity scandal did have a very substantive impact on students. It meant they had a lot less income support than other Canadians. It was and continues to be the position of the NDP that this was wrong, but even more so because a scandal on the government benches, and a pretty massive mishandling of a program, issued in that aspect of the promise and the income support program for students not being delivered at all.
I think it's pretty clear that the issues of WE Charity, whether you agree or disagree about the ultimate motive, are germane to the issue of prorogation. It is really hard to pretend that this isn't the case. Reasonable people can disagree about what was preponderant in terms of the reasons. Yes, we're going through a global pandemic. Yes, that also matters.
However, we've heard testimony about the various lengths of prorogation that could have been obtained. We've heard some arguments about why certain people on the government side think we needed a longer period, although I note that they are preparing a budget, or at least that's what they tell us.
They haven't prorogued Parliament, in order to prepare the budget, because they need to consult with people. Most governments can walk and chew gum. Nobody has made it obvious to me that a prorogation was necessary in order to consult for a Speech from the Throne. I think that's pretty silly. Actually, budgets are a more difficult enterprise to prepare in many cases than throne speeches, yet Parliament sits even as government consults and prepares budget documents.
As Mr. Long pointed out earlier, the theme of much of the testimony was that all roads lead back to the on this. It's the Prime Minister's own policy that caused us to be here studying this issue in the first place. It is the Prime Minister's decision ultimately, as Mr. Long emphasized for us today, to decide whether or not to prorogue. It's a decision that he is within his constitutional authority to make—nobody is contesting that—but there is a job here. It's not the job of a judge. It's okay for members to have opinions about what may or may not be the case. It's not simply the job of a prosecutor, although it's more like that. Our job is to provide some political accountability for decision-makers.
Everybody has been very clear, including Mr. Long earlier today, that the only real decision-maker here is the . We're evaluating a decision that he made. He had the right to make it. We're doing that under the guise of a policy that he developed in order to prevent political abuses of prorogation. Either it's all political all the way down...in which case I think, yes, the WE Charity scandal does have something to do with it. Let's hear it out.
The other path is to see this as an exercise in establishing a precedent for how these studies should unfold, recognizing that there will likely always be some measure of disagreement about the nature of a prorogation if it's contentious. This one is. Some prorogations haven't been. In those cases, it will matter less. You might find cross-party agreement that it's not worth having the testify at a committee. Certainly, in the cases where it's contentious, it is worth it. I think that is part of what the Prime Minister envisioned. He knew that the Harper prorogations were contentious. He thought that needed to be addressed. I think it's wholly appropriate that he come here for an hour to defend his decisions. He sent his . They wrote some things out.
Look, we have question period every day. We don't just say, “Oh, well, the already made a statement about that. You shouldn't ask him questions about it anymore.” We do that because there is a role for holding our elected members of the government to account for the decisions they make. We've heard clearly that this was the decision of the Prime Minister.
We're here because of a policy of the . We're setting precedent. It's fine for the Liberals on the committee to believe that there were good reasons for this prorogation. That's fine, but that doesn't mean that we should set a bad precedent.
There will be times in the future when Liberal members will feel that a prime minister has abused the power of prorogation. What we're deciding here, as far as I'm concerned, is how we're going to proceed not only in this case but in future cases. Barring having a mechanism whereby the House of Commons actually gets to pronounce on the issue before there's a prorogation—in other words, barring having a system where the House of Commons votes on whether or not it's appropriate to prorogue—the least we could do under this second-best measure is to set the precedent that the comes and defends his decision to the committee.
After we've had the benefit of hearing from experts and civil society and have some preliminary arguments from government members, I think the committee is now ready to test the on those reasons. I understand he's confident about his reasons. Maybe I have that wrong. Any member of the governing party can correct me on that, but I understand that he's pretty confident that he had good reasons, so fine—let him come. He's confident about other things he has to defend in question period every day. Nobody says, “Don't ask the question because you already have an idea that you won't like the answer.” I don't see why that should be different in this case.
I've proposed a way out of this, which is to dispense with all of the calls for documents, and all of the other witness requests, for one hour of the 's time at this committee in order to set a good precedent for how the procedure and House affairs committee—not just for this prorogation but for all prorogation studies to come—can handle these issues. There will come a day when members of this committee who seem to think it doesn't make sense for the Prime Minister to come now will think that it's perfectly appropriate for a prime minister to come and defend their decision of prorogation.
I'm not prepared to yield on this. I'm not prepared to support this amendment, and I'm not prepared to turn on the main motion until I hear from the [Technical difficulty—Editor] to defend what was his decision.
We've heard that very clearly. We've heard it from witnesses, and now we've heard it from Liberals on this very committee. It was his decision. He has his reasons. There are clearly disputes about what the reasons were. Yes, we're going to ask him questions about the WE Charity scandal, and if he can survive the hour, which I suspect he will, things will go on and we'll turn to other issues, but I think it's a terrible precedent to allow this committee to close off this study without having heard from the one person who actually makes the call. I'm not prepared to endorse such a terrible precedent.
That's as simple as it is. If Liberals want to move on, then I encourage the members of this committee to go to their leader and impress upon him the benefit that would accrue from his coming and spending one hour to defend a decision he made—and they agree he has good reasons he can share for having made it—and the opposition will do its job of holding him to account and testing those reasons in the ways that we can, and then we can close off the study and move on.
To pretend that this is some kind of bottomless political pandemic...not bottomless political pandemic. Excuse me. The word is on the mind. To pretend that this is some political thing all the way down and that there isn't a reasonable solution on the table, I think that point presses the boundaries of honesty, Madam Chair, because there is a very simple way out of this. It's to have the announce publicly that he's going to come here for an hour and for us to spend the hour with him and move onto something else. It's that simple.
I don't see why a man who proposed this very study as the way to prevent the kinds of abuses of prorogation that I would say we saw under Stephen Harper.... I can't for the life of me understand why he's not willing to come and spend an hour with us now on that, not only to show that he had a meaningful idea about how to prevent the political abuse of prorogation—because the government just tabling a pretty fluffy report without actually sending the decision-maker to answer for it doesn't meet the threshold of political accountability that I would like to see—but also for future instances.
I don't think people would have accepted in the days of Harper that he would have just tabled a fluffy report and been done with it and not appeared. I think that if this mechanism is to have teeth and be a meaningful response to those abuses, then the should show his face here. If he's not willing to do that, I think that's too bad.
I would hope then that Canadians who are listening would understand why it is so important that the House of Commons have a vote before prorogation, because if a prime minister really does have plan that's not contentious in terms of the time it would take away from Parliament and has good reasons to restart a session, then no prime minister should fear going to the House of Commons with a reasonable argument.
We saw during the pandemic the budget that's supposed to be coming in April now is long delayed. It was delayed in the early stages, although we've been calling for a budget for some time now. Initially, that delay was endorsed by the parties of the House, and even the main estimates, which are legally required to be tabled by a certain date, were pushed back because the House was quite reasonable.
In the future, prime ministers who have a reasonable prorogation request could trust that the House would grant it. Where it's contentious, I don't think one person should be making the call. That's why Canadians elect many people to make decisions, not one person to make decisions.
To me, this is not about all of those politics, although they are there, and if the comes, I will ask him questions about the WE Charity scandal, because I do think it's germane to prorogation and we heard that in the testimony. However, for me, this is really about the procedure and House affairs committee of the House of Commons of Canada setting a precedent, under a new mechanism by this very Prime Minister, in order to prevent political abuses of prorogation. I want a good precedent and I'm not willing to walk away from that.
I just want to remind my Liberal colleagues of that, because that doesn't come through in their remarks. They're casting a very wide net about the opposition parties this and the opposition parties that. That's not my position. My position is how we proceed with this mechanism and make it as meaningful as possible, understanding that it is already by its nature an inferior solution to actually granting more power to Canadians' elected representatives over the issue of prorogation.
I thank you very much for listening to that point again. I've said my piece and I will happily cede the floor to the next speaker.
:
Thank you very much, Madam Chair.
I'm pleased to resume the floor on the amendment of my colleague Mr. Turnbull, who will have an opportunity to address the topic again.
First, I want to thank Mr. Turnbull. I would also like to thank Ms. Duncan and Mr. Long for their inspirational speeches. They are passionate, they speak from the heart, and they are very determined. We're inevitably inspired when we have the good fortune to hear from these experienced individuals.
After the amendment was introduced, we had time to examine the reasons for excluding the Prime Minister's testimony and including that of the Deputy Prime Minister and the Minister of Finance. After analyzing the remarks of all the members and more closely considering the amendment introduced by Mr. Turnbull…
[English]
Something has happened. I have an issue.
[Translation]
Can you hear me?
Then I'll continue. As I was saying, I took a look at the report the government tabled on the reasons leading to Mr. Turnbull's amendment. I'm going to support the amendment because it's a good compromise, even though I would personally have liked to forge ahead and abandon the idea of hearing witnesses other than those we've heard to date, including Mr. Rodriguez.
That being said, the report that Mr. Rodriguez tabled in the House of Commons really paints a picture of the situation facing our government and country during the pandemic. The report also made me reflect on the cooperation we've observed among members, regardless of party. We've felt that we're here for Canadians despite the pandemic. Mr. Turnbull's amendment makes me wonder how far we could go by having the Deputy Prime Minister testify before the committee.
The words Mr. Turnbull uses in his amendment are entirely legitimate. My colleague Mr. Long has used terms relating more to the collective bargaining process. I don't want to use those terms because we aren't operating in a reciprocity context. I would say instead that this is a good compromise.
This good compromise, under which we would delete the first paragraph and invite the Deputy Prime Minister and the to appear before the committee for at least 90 minutes, is an extremely valid one. We've already made considerable progress toward asking all the questions to which we already know the answers.
I've also thought about the role of cooperation in a minority government context.
I'm a newcomer to federal politics, and I haven't experienced this in municipal politics. I've served two terms, but I've never had to work with the opposition when my party was in power. I experienced it in 2015, when the government came to power. Now I know what it means to work with the opposition.
We've done some good things. I was much impressed to see that a government could be functional even as a minority government. We've definitely shown how we can serve Canadians.
Again with respect to Mr. Turnbull's amendment, the Deputy Prime Minister could show us how the work was done before, during and after the prorogation.
I feel I have to support Mr. Turnbull's motion so I can say that open-mindedness still has a place on this committee. That's given me food for thought.
What I really find disappointing is to see that a party has decided that politics and scoring political points take precedence over the common good. That's what bothers me.
We've done a lot of work together. We're proud we're still here. We aren't yet talking about the pandemic in the past tense, but rather in the present. We don't want to abandon all the work we've done together. Some people say our government hasn't acted in good faith. However, we've made good decisions, and we'll have to make more. It's disappointing to see that people are trying to turn this into a political football.
The Deputy Prime Minister could confirm for the committee that we don't need to hear testimony from the Prime Minister. She could also confirm that we've offered emergency support to more than 8 million Canadians through the Canada emergency response benefit. That's not nothing. We've helped people who have lost their jobs by providing the Canada emergency rent subsidy. I still have to process certain cases in my riding even today. I have to intervene and call people back.
People are still trying to play politics over a motion.
Mr. Turnbull's amendment should be debated. Mr. Blaikie clearly indicated in his remarks that he's opposed to the amendment to the motion. What I want to do is continue arguing as long as possible so I can show all the members, including Mr. Blaikie, that we should forget about inviting the Prime Minister. We already have all the evidence we need to prove that achieved nothing on the outside.
We're trying to make a connection between the Prime Minister's appearance and the prorogation and between the Prime Minister's appearance and the WE Charity. I encourage my colleagues to reread the questions in the report. It states that, from the outset, they made a connection between the WE Charity and the questions we put to witnesses. So there's nothing new. They're saying that the Prime Minister must say it, but I would remind you that at no time did the Conservative Prime Minister of the time, Mr. Harper, have to testify before the committees with regard to the prorogation. A prime minister is usually not invited to appear before committee. However, Prime Minister Justin Trudeau did just that.
The work we've done together has helped support millions of Canadians. We've helped people stay in business and cope better with the circumstances of this economic and health crisis that we've discussed at such great length. We've also help people get back on their feet and put food on the table. We put in place old age security and the guaranteed income supplement. You know the latter is my baby and how important it was for me to make the right decisions.
With respect to Mr. Turnbull's amendment, the Deputy Prime Minister could come and talk to the committee about Canadians living in residential long-term care centres, seniors living in private residences and those living at home and who were isolated because they didn't even dare go to the grocery store or drugstore.
We put financial assistance in place for Canadians living with disabilities and advanced one-time non-taxable payments of $600. That also affects a large percentage of seniors who, as they age, suffer from disabilities that prevent them from readily fitting into society and performing everyday tasks. So we've assisted them. Canadians, particularly those living with disabilities, remember that the Conservatives tried to block that support. Imagine that! They tried to block support for persons with disabilities.
The Deputy Prime Minister could come and tell you that the government has invested in support for Canada's food banks and about what we've achieved. We don't need to see the Prime Minister because the Deputy Prime Minister is also the Minister of Finance. So it's important that she come and provide answers to all your questions on pandemic-related needs, measures that we have taken and why we prorogued Parliament.
We've also invested in food banks and assisted community partners in meeting housing needs and the safety-related needs of the homeless. We've also introduced a support measure to house 500 persons. At the very moment we were making major decisions, the provinces did the same. Some imposed curfews, which proved to be a problem for homeless individuals. So we had to act quickly. The Deputy Prime Minister could come and tell you about that and explain the homelessness situation to you.
We also supported more than 500 women's shelters and centres for sexual assault victims during the COVID-19 pandemic. The number of female sexual assault victims has increased during that time for all the reasons we are well aware of.
No one is in a better position to testify before the committee than the Deputy Prime Minister, who is a woman and is highly sensitive to the cause of women, to finance and the pandemic. It's not the Prime Minister's role to meet and speak with us since we have all the necessary staff and answers to the questions we've put to the right witnesses. In addition, Mr. Turnbull's amendment affords us an opportunity to hear from the Deputy Prime Minister in committee.
I also haven't told you about our cooperation with our first nations, Métis and Inuit partners. We've invested $2.2 billion to find community solutions and immediately meet the public health needs of indigenous persons. There's little discussion of the socioeconomic phenomenon caused by the pandemic in indigenous communities, but it's extremely important that we discuss it today.
The Deputy Prime Minister also could have come and told you about the students who had to face a very different labour market last year. Many students in my riding found themselves without a job because tourism is a large part of my riding's economy. We also have a lot of jobs in the restaurant and hotel industries, outfitting and access to watersports. All those students wound up unemployed.
The Deputy Prime Minister could also come and talk, as Mr. Turnbull's amendment proposes, about how we introduced the Canada emergency student benefit, which provided financial support to more than 700,000 students. A little later, I'll tell you about the WE Charity's approach to students. You'll understand what I'm getting at. I'm going to make the connection with Mr. Turnbull's amendment.
What the Deputy Prime Minister could come and tell you is that we've enabled small, medium and large Canadian businesses in all sectors to stay afloat. We introduced a business credit program and measures designed to support local jobs and the economies of all Canadian regions through all six regional development agencies in Canada. Our officials have worked hard from the start to adjust to the programs we're trying to develop to assist the public.
Dr. Duncan has addressed the health issue. No one on this committee is in a better position to discuss health. She's been criticized for not speaking directly to the amendment, but I'm pleased to take the floor to thank her for her efforts. She has made me think, once again, about how important today's debate is. We can ask Dr. Duncan all the questions we want to put to the Deputy Prime Minister about what we've done to improve the health of Canadians as a result of this prorogation. So her speech directly concerned the amendment. I tip my hat to her.
Despite some setbacks, such as those I mentioned a few moments ago, we've managed to do these things and to offer these programs because we've worked together. "Together" is an important word. We've put Canadians first.
Now we're witnessing a dangerous trend toward casting the interests of Canadians aside and focusing solely on political gains. We see what's happening in the committees. No one's trying to advance files; some just want committees to suspend their meetings until a later date, while others extend their sitting times, sometimes until early morning, if necessary. It's gotten that bad. It's a dangerous game.
I'm prepared to do my job just as I've done it, but I'll defend Mr. Turnbull's amendment tooth and nail. Mr. Blaikie said in his speech that he was completely opposed to the idea of inviting the Deputy Prime Minister and that he absolutely wanted to summon the Prime Minister, but I'll keep working as long as necessary to have Mr. Turnbull's amendment accepted.
The motion we're debating today is a clear example of that. The amendment that Mr. Turnbull has introduced is nevertheless a compromise, and that's evidence of an open mind. Mr. Blaikie has clearly shown us he doesn't have an open mind, and he's unfortunately not the only one. The same is true of the Conservatives. You need only look at what happened in the House: the Conservatives used every possible tactic to delay and block adoption of extremely important bills.
I don't want to join the debate on medical assistance in dying. We could discuss that for a very long time. I want to stick to Mr. Turnbull's amendment. Today let's conduct an appropriate examination of the bill on the fall economic statement. What does that bill actually contain?
We're going to talk briefly about figures because they're really important. Under this amendment, since she's also the Minister of Finance, the Deputy Prime Minister could come and explain to us how funding of up to $505.7 million [Technical difficulty—Editor], including funding to prevent the spread of COVID-19, outbreaks and deaths. These are decisions that have been made.
She could come and justify the prorogation and talk about emergency support for low-income families who are entitled to the Canada child benefit. Mr. Turnbull also discussed the importance of the child benefit. The amount of the benefit could range up to $1,200 for each child under the age of six in 2021. These families aren't just thanking the Liberals; they're thanking all members of Parliament for granting Canadians $1,200 per child to support them during the pandemic.
The Deputy Prime Minister could also come and discuss the elimination of interest on repayment of the federal portion of Canada student and apprentice loans for 2021-2022. That measure lightens the financial burden of 1.4 million young Canadians. Those young people are my children and your children, children who need support in order to pay for their studies, who need summer jobs. I have one daughter at university and another studying at a community college. They're at the age where education is expensive. My three daughters, of whom I am extremely proud, have received a good education. However, that education is costing me a lot of money. So I can tell you that student assistance is very much appreciated.
Incidentally, a single scholarship made it possible for one of my daughters to study in Europe, acquire incredible life experience and come home with an invaluable addition to her education. That's what subsidies are for, and that's the result of the decisions we make. Thanks to certain political decisions, my daughter had an opportunity to visit a number of countries.
The Europeans invest in high-speed trains and accessible and affordable public transit. We have quite a way to go in that respect, and we must follow their example. We absolutely have to put subsidy programs in place. We have to help young students develop here and elsewhere by providing grants so they can study as long as possible. As one teacher said, young people who study today will be supporting us tomorrow. They're our future and we must continue supporting them.
The WE Charity had, and still has, an objective, which is to help young people do volunteer work, get paid and save money to go back to school in September, all in order to assist parents like me. I have three daughters, two of whom are still in school.
It's important that every one of the decisions we make for young students is made in the greater interest of students and parents as a whole. We often see grandparents providing assistance. In so doing, they skip a generation. We see grandparents assisting their grandchildren because education costs include rent, books, Internet registrations, subscriptions, cell phone service, computers and tablets; in short, the equipment that young people need at university. Those costs are exorbitant, particularly for parents who have more than one child. They are already exorbitant for a single child; imagine when there are three.
The Deputy Prime Minister could explain all that to us because we're talking about money. She could even tell us about funding, which could reach $262 million, to support COVID-19-related tests, medical research, countermeasures and vaccine funding and development. We're standing in the midst of it all.
Parliament was prorogued in order to improve the situation. If the Deputy Prime Minister could come and testify pursuant to Mr. Turnbull's amendment, she would tell us how important funding is. She would also tell us about the decisions and measures made respecting transfers to the provinces to assist them with medical supplies and long-term care facilities. She could even include all the measures that apply to borders and travellers, as well as the extensive management of quarantine sites. The opposition parties enjoyed telling us that the process of booking appointments was long and complicated. However, we reinvent the wheel every week we make a decision.
Every time the integrity of the system was attacked, I felt uncomfortable for our public servants, and I found that unfortunate because they were affected by those comments. As you know, my riding is in the Outaouais region, where a lot of public servants live. It's largely rural, but some of my colleagues, Mr. Fergus and Mr. MacKinnon in particular, have many public servants in their constituencies. We're fortunate to cross paths with those public servants, and, when we do, they confront us and ask us whether we're aware of the work they have to do when we make a decision in the House of Commons or propose a program we would like to see adapted within a week. Can you just imagine the pressure these people are under?
For example, Ms. Freeland is the best person to tell us about and make us understand the delays caused at the Department of Revenue and those associated with a measure that we've introduced and that involves our officials. The Deputy Prime Minister is in the best position to discuss that with us because she has attended pandemic-related briefings every day. She could come and tell us about the budgets the various measures entail. She's aware of what goes on and regularly answers virtually all questions raised in the House. She's an exceptional woman who would be entirely capable of doing the upcoming work.
I initially wanted to abandon Mr. Turnbull's amendment. Having read, listened and spoken about it, however, I would now accept it. I would have good questions to put to the Deputy Prime Minister concerning the prorogation.
As a result of Mr. Turnbull's amendment, I would give the Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of Finance an opportunity to come and testify before the committee.
She could also tell us about the funding that could amount to [Technical difficulty—Editor] to support access to virtual care, including mental health care. I'm thinking, for example, of the substance abuse support program. I've discussed it at length since I'm particularly concerned by it.
Without wanting to repeat myself, the most vulnerable people are seniors in long-term care facilities. They suffer from isolation, often finding themselves in a small room with a sink, a bed and a chair.
The best person to tell you about that, particularly about the care of women, is the Deputy Prime Minister. There is no one better than a woman to understand and discuss the situation of women, including problems of family violence, isolation, mental health and declining independence. Women are more affected than men. I'm very sensitive to that.
I'm pleased to have a feminist Prime Minister, but I'd be even more pleased if the Deputy Prime Minister came and testified on the situation of women…
:
Thank you very much, Madam Chair.
I'll continue with my thoughts about my colleague Mr. Turnbull's amendment.
Technical difficulty end of the pandemic and when Canadians would be ready to enter the economic restart phase, we wanted to do something to ensure that all Canadians would actually be ready.
On the prorogation issue, it's clear that the government really wanted to assess the situation and also make sure that we could consult people. I know that the Minister of Finance, Ms. Freeland, as well as Minister Fortier and the caucus in general, did indeed consult people to make sure that everyone could understand the government's priorities.
The Speech from the Throne clearly describes avenues that could boost the economic recovery and where the federal government sees an opportunity to help industries prosper. Here again, my understanding is that if Minister Freeland were to give evidence before the committee, she could explain the ideas put forward in the throne speech.
As we do battle on behalf of all Canadians and defend everyone's capacity to succeed, we also need to focus on the future and on a better way to build our programs. It's what the throne speech describes as the third of the government's foundations in its approach.
We find the following in the throne speech:
Around the world, advanced economies are realizing that things should not go back to business as usual. COVID-19 has exposed the vulnerabilities in our societies.
The Government will create a resiliency agenda for the middle class and people working hard to join it.
This will include addressing the gaps in our social systems, investing in health care, and creating jobs.
I think that all members here today also want to invest in health care and creating jobs.
It will also include fighting climate change, and maintaining a commitment to fiscal sustainability and economic growth as the foundation of a strong and vibrant society.
I'd like to take a few moments to say that we've finally been able to bridge the gaps and identify those in our systems. We want to ensure that our existing programs are strengthened, because we want to support the most vulnerable people in our communities.
My colleague, , often talks about seniors. One of the greatest tragedies of this pandemic is the lives lost in long-term care homes. Seniors deserve to be respected, safe and live in dignity.
I know that in my region—the small province of New Brunswick—there may not have been the major outbreaks that occurred in other regions, but some care homes were affected. It's truly heartbreaking. We want to make sure that we can protect our seniors.
One of my nephews is in the Canadian Armed Forces. Many of his colleagues were sent to care for our seniors. These people, who went to war in Afghanistan, were genuinely traumatized by what they saw in the care homes. When my brawny nephew spoke to me about it, he had tears in his eyes. These were truly difficult situations. The report written by the armed forces clearly describes the situation our seniors are facing. It's important for us to be there for them.
Although long-term care is a provincial and territorial jurisdiction, the federal government will do everything it can to support seniors, working alongside the provinces and territories.
Once again, I want to point out that it's wrong to believe that the federal government has all the answers. We need to work closely with the provinces and territories so that national standards can be complied with. To accomplish this, the provinces need to be at the table with us, because we all have a role to play in protecting the help health and safety of seniors.
The government will work with Parliament on Criminal Code amendments to explicitly penalize those who neglect seniors under their care, putting them in danger.
Prior to being elected as a politician, I was a social worker with the Royal Canadian Mounted Police for several years.
I must say that it was always very difficult to investigate instances of violence against seniors. We often had to investigate members of the immediate family when most of the time, the abusers were the caregivers. Generally speaking, seniors did not even want to talk about what had happened to them, because they were afraid and felt intimidated. It's essential for us to do everything in our power to protect these people, who are often very vulnerable.
The government will also work with the provinces and territories to set new, national standards for long-term care so that seniors get the best support possible.
Once again, we are definitely not saying that Ottawa has all the answers. I'm sure, however, that the application of consistent standards in all the provinces and territories is the least we can do to ensure that seniors receive proper care. I'm pleased that our government is working towards this.
If Minister Freeland were to come and give evidence before the committee, she could speak to us about it. It's not only a matter of developing standards, but also explaining the possible investments, and the thinking that went into the new throne speech. She could also any answer any additional questions my colleagues might have.
We also need to take further action to help people stay at home longer. Of course, not all seniors live in long-term care homes, but it's obvious that they experienced truly difficult circumstances throughout the pandemic, particularly in terms of isolation.
I'll give you an example of one measure that was introduced in New Brunswick. In 2018, we set up a pilot project called the "Healthy Seniors Pilot Project". It required an investment of $75 million.
We funded several programs that would enable seniors to continue to live at home for as long as possible. They often did not want to move into long-term care homes, but they did need additional assistance.
One of the programs that we funded was called "Nursing Homes Without Walls". Seniors often needed help to take their medicine, do their grocery shopping and other similar tasks. This kind of program contributed enormously to improving the lives of our seniors, even during the pandemic.
I think that we're capable of continuing to support our seniors in difficult times.
The federal government will also look into measures for personal support workers, who provide an essential service by helping the most vulnerable people in our communities. Canada must better value their work and their contributions to our society.
To be perfectly clear, 90 to 95% of them are women. These women work in care homes, grocery stores, and provide homecare and other services.
We need to help protect these workers so that they receive equitable pay. The whole issue of pay equity has to be addressed. Clearly, responsibility for this is not wholly the federal government's, but it needs to work with the provinces and territories.
Once again, I believe that Ms. Freeland might be helpful by explaining to us the plan that was developed for further discussion of these issues.
COVID-19 has also disproportionately affected Canadians with disabilities, and highlighted long-standing challenges for members of this community. The government will bring forward a disability inclusion plan, which will have a new Canadian disability benefit modelled on the guaranteed income supplement for seniors, a robust employment strategy for Canadians with disabilities, and a better process to determine eligibility for government disability programs and benefits.
Ms. Freeland would probably be able to give us more information about these funding programs and explain the process that led to their being announced in the throne speech.
Over the past six months, it has become clearer than ever that Canadians need a resilient health care system. All my colleagues are requesting additional funding for services, and thus far, I feel confident in saying that the government has contributed greatly to helping Canadians during this pandemic.
The federal government invested in vaccines and paid for all of the required equipment. Under the Safe Restart Agreement, considerable investment went to the provinces and territories, much of which was invested in health systems.
The government will make sure that everyone, including people in rural and remote regions, has access to a family doctor or a primary care team. COVID-19 has also shown that our system needs to be more flexible and capable of reaching out to people at home. The government will continue to increase its capacity to provide virtual health care.
Many of my colleagues probably live in large regions. In the province of New Brunswick, there are many rural regions. It's often difficult to get to doctor's appointments. And the issue of virtual care has come to the fore during the pandemic. Many professionals would also like these services to continue. This requires investment. I presume that the Deputy Prime Minister could also talk to us about this if she were to testify before the committee.
The government will also continue to address the opioid epidemic tearing through communities, which is an ongoing and worsening public health crisis. We are experiencing a global health crisis because of COVID-19, but we mustn't forget that there are other crises in Canada. The opioid crisis is clearly a tragedy. Every day, Canadians are dying. We still have a great deal of work to do. While we need to address the pandemic, we mustn't forget the opioid crisis and the climate crisis.
So there needs to be ongoing investment in this area, particularly under the Canadian drugs and substances strategy. We've made serious investments thus far, and need to continue. The Deputy Prime Minister could speak to us about investments and priorities with respect to the opioid crisis. It's something I feel strongly about.
Of course, the 2020 Speech from the Throne is not the same as the 2019 speech, but there are similarities between the two because in 2019, there were emergencies that are still ongoing today. Moreover, the issue of priorities came up because of the pandemic.
When I was minister of health, I had the opportunity to meet many health workers and people who were using substances. They told us that prevention and treatment were required. They were very happy that the Liberal government had reintroduced the idea of harm reduction. The Conservative government didn't want to touch the subject, although it was a priority for us.
We need to meet people on their own ground and make sure they have the required tools. Health workers were very pleased with our work, of course, but much remains to be done.
I'll stop there for the time being on this subject. I'll return to it if I have any further comments to make.
:
If I wasn't here, I would want to speak to this matter because it is an important matter, and I know that it affects all of us. We are all impacted by intimate partner violence. We all know someone. Even if we don't think we know someone, we know someone. I've learned that.
[Translation]
Ms. Normandin, I was sorry to hear about another death in Quebec only a few days ago. News like that is heartbreaking.
To keep building strong communities, over the next two years the government will also invest in all types of infrastructure, including public transit, energy efficient retrofits, clean energy, rural broadband, and affordable housing, particularly for indigenous peoples and northern communities.
Once again, if Minister Freeland were here with us, she could clarify some of the ideas put forward in the throne speech and the reasons for these investments.
Can't we recognize once again that this pandemic has shown clearly who the most vulnerable people are?
In the last six months, many more people have worked from home, done classes from the kitchen table, shopped online, and accessed government services remotely. So it has become more important than ever that all Canadians have access to the Internet.
We have all had the experience of working from home and occasionally having technical problems. We need to make the investments required for all Canadians to have access to Internet services. They are no longer a luxury, and have become a necessity.
The government will accelerate the connectivity timelines and ambitions of the Universal Broadband Fund to ensure that all Canadians, no matter where they live, have access to high-speed Internet.
Where I live, in Moncton, we receive really good services from my small province of New Brunswick. I always say that we can thank Frank McKenna, the former premier of the province, because he understood what the future would bring, and the required investments were made for us in the province. It's very good.
I'm going to continue to explain to you why I support my colleague Mr. Turnbull's amendment. To further help our communities, the government will work with partners to support regional routes for airlines. It is essential that Canadians have access to reliable and affordable regional air services. It is an issue of equity, of jobs, and of economic development. The government will work to support this.
So we can see that many changes are happening in the regions. We want the economy to restart, and investments are definitely going to be made in the regions.
No one should be without a place to stay during a pandemic or a Canadian winter. In October 2020, the government invested more than $1 billion for people experiencing homelessness. Last fall, Minister Hussen invested this amount to create rapid housing. I believe that those who will get a home have just learned that their applications were approved. To be sure, there were many more applications than the number of homes available, because they came from several regions across Canada. However, people are obtaining more and more assistance and funds have been invested.
I know that in Moncton, the homeless situation has been much more visible in recent years. Once again, the pandemic has highlighted these truly vulnerable people. That's why I'm happy that the minister made these investments.
That is another area on which Minister Freeland could provide us with further details. She could also explain to us what led to these investments, and how they came to be announced in the throne speech.
In 2017, the government announced that it would reduce chronic homelessness by 50 percent. It has already helped more than a million people get a safe and affordable place to call home. Given the progress that has been made, and our commitment to do more, the government is now focused on entirely eliminating chronic homelessness in Canada.
At the same time, the government will also make substantial investments in housing for Canadians.
I'm really looking forward to tomorrow, because a special announcement will be made in my region. A group there has been doing incredible work and handling the initiative to create rapid housing. Together, we're going to make an announcement tomorrow about something that will provide considerable assistance to my community.
The government will add to the historic National Housing Strategy announced in 2017 by increasing investments to rapid housing in the short term, and partnering with not-for-profits and co-ops in the mid- to long-term. For the middle class, the government will also move forward with enhancements to the First-Time Home Buyer Incentive, including in Canada’s largest cities, so families can afford to buy their first home. Once more, I think that Minister Freeland could come and speak to us about this.
As a result of the pandemic, people from big cities in Ontario and even Western Canada have been choosing to move to our province or one of the other beautiful Atlantic provinces where housing is more affordable. That's a good thing, but it has been driving up the cost of housing here. That's why I'm very pleased that our government is helping people to purchase their first home. Housing is something everyone deserves, and it’s also a key driver of the economy. Construction projects create jobs, and having a home is critical so people can contribute to their communities.
Just as everyone deserves a home, everyone deserves to be able to put nutritious food on the table. Everyone should have food in the refrigerator. The pandemic has made that harder for Canadians. Canada will continue to work with partners—including directly with first nations, Inuit, and Métis nation partners—to address food insecurity in Canada. The government will also strengthen local food supply chains here in Canada. Here again, I think that Minister Freeland could probably tell us more about it.
The foreign workers who produce, harvest, and process our food—from people picking fruit to packing seafood—have done an outstanding job getting good food to Canadians. They deserve the government’s full support and protection. The government will ensure that those in Canada’s supply managed sectors receive full and fair compensation for recent trade agreements. Farmers keep our families fed, and we will continue to help them succeed and grow.
This pandemic has revealed gaps in health, housing, and food supply. And it has also maintained the inequalities Canadians face in the workforce. We have an opportunity to not only support Canadians, but also grow their potential.
Working with the provinces and territories, the government will make the largest investment in Canadian history in training for workers. This will include supporting Canadians as they build new skills in growing sectors, helping workers receive education and accreditation, and strengthening workers’ futures, by connecting them to employers and good jobs, in order to grow and strengthen the middle class.
From researchers developing vaccines, to entrepreneurs building online stores, this pandemic has reminded us of the power of the knowledge economy, and how vital it is for our future. Canadians are leading, and they should have state-of-the-art government services. The government will make generational investments in updating outdated IT systems to modernize the way that government serves Canadians, from the elderly to the young, from people looking for work to those living with a disability.
The government will also work to introduce free, automatic tax filing for simple returns to ensure citizens receive the benefits they need. Government must remain agile, and ready for what lies ahead.
I would like to end with a few comments about combating climate change. As I was saying earlier, a number of priorities have been changed compared to the 2019 and 2020 priorities. However, climate change is a priority for this generation, and we need to move ahead.
Climate action will be a cornerstone of our plan to support and create a million jobs across the country. This is where the world is going. Global consumers and investors are demanding and rewarding climate action. Canadians have the determination and ingenuity to rise to this challenge and global market opportunity. We can create good jobs today and a globally competitive economy not just next year, but in 2030, 2040, and beyond.
Canadians also know climate change threatens their health, their way of life, and their planet. They want climate action now, and that is what the government will continue to deliver. I know that some people are still wondering about the climate crisis. We Liberals know that it really is a priority for Canadians.
The government will immediately bring forward a plan to exceed Canada’s 2030 climate goal. It will also legislate Canada’s goal of net-zero emissions by 2050 and will reach this goal.
As part of its plan, the government will create thousands of jobs retrofitting buildings, cutting energy costs for Canadian families and businesses. We're going to invest in reducing the impact of climate-related disasters like floods and wildfires to make communities safer and more resilient.
The 2020 throne speech made it clear that climate change issues are a real priority. Once again, if Ms. Freeland were to appear, she could give us her point of view on the inclusion of climate change issues in the throne speech.
We also want to assist Canadians by helping to deliver more transit and active transit options, and making zero-emission vehicles more affordable while investing in more charging stations across the country. Zero-emission vehicles are somewhat more expensive and we want to make them more affordable for Canadians. Based on the various programs that have been established, it's clear that we are well on our way.
A good example of adapting to a carbon-neutral future is the zero-emission battery. Canada has the nickel and copper resources needed for these clean technologies. This, combined with Canadian expertise, is Canada’s competitive edge.
To top it off, the government will launch a new fund to attract investments in making zero-emission products and cut the corporate tax rate in half for these companies to create jobs and make Canada a world leader in clean technology. The government will ensure Canada is the most competitive country in the world for clean technology companies.
In the throne speech, several priorities were clearly tied to the pandemic. What we really want to do is build a better world and a better society. When we talk about building back better, we want to be sure that we can make the investments needed to build a better and more prosperous society for everyone.
Additionally, the government wants to transform our economy and communities by moving forward with the Clean Power Fund, and projects like the Atlantic Loop that will connect surplus clean power to regions transitioning away from coal. The Atlantic Loop project is really galvanizing us, and it is a priority for our region.
The government will support investments in renewable energy and next-generation clean energy and technology solutions. Canada cannot reach net zero without the know-how of the energy sector, and the innovative ideas of all Canadians, including people in places like British Columbia, Alberta, Saskatchewan, and Newfoundland and Labrador.
By creating good-paying and long-lasting jobs, we want to support manufacturing, natural resource, and energy sectors as they work to transform to meet a net zero future.
We want to recognize farmers, foresters, and ranchers as key partners in the fight against climate change by supporting their efforts to reduce emissions and build resilience.
The government will continue its policy of putting a price on pollution, while putting that money back in the pockets of Canadians. We cannot be free to pollute. I think that the court was very clear on this matter in its decision today. This pandemic has reminded Canadians of the importance of nature. The government will work with municipalities.