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Results: 1 - 15 of 843
View Nathaniel Erskine-Smith Profile
Lib. (ON)
Mr. Speaker, the last two petitions, 11279761 and 11278785, note that indigenous peoples have rights and title to their traditional territories and have been stewards of these lands. As well, the climate crisis requires action, and old-growth forests provide immeasurable benefits.
Old-growth ecosystems in B.C. are endangered, yet logging still continues. Of the remaining almost 3% of the original high-productivity, old-growth forests in B.C., 75% are still slated to be logged.
The petitioners call upon the Government of Canada to, among other things, work with provinces and first nations to immediately halt logging of endangered, old-growth ecosystems and to fund the long-term protection of old-growth ecosystems as a priority.
View Gord Johns Profile
NDP (BC)
View Gord Johns Profile
2021-06-22 10:31 [p.8940]
Madam Speaker, it is an honour to table e-petition 3174 today.
The petitioners cite that Health Canada has an open file to license a medical marijuana facility at 7827 Beaver Creek Road, in Port Alberni, British Columbia. They cite that the Walmart-sized cannabis facility would be located directly across the street from Kackaamin, a first nations family trauma and addictions healing centre that provides treatment to adults, while housing the entire family. Kackaamin is doing the work of healing from their shared history of colonialism and residential schools. They were never consulted in the initial planning of the facility and have requested that the facility be located elsewhere.
The petitioners are calling on the government to acknowledge the implicit racism in the policy choices of Health Canada's cannabis licensing process and handling of this file. They are calling on the government to expedite review of this file and cancel all cannabis licenses at 7821 Beaver Creek Road. They ask the government also to apologize to Kackaamin and reaffirm its commitment to UNDRIP and the TRC’s calls to action.
View Sylvie Bérubé Profile
BQ (QC)
Mr. Speaker, today is National Indigenous Peoples Day, but commemorations are not enough, especially after what happened in Kamloops. This day must be one of action and must focus on respectful nation-to-nation collaboration, in spite of the gravity of residential schools. That is why the Bloc Québécois spoke to the different assemblies representing the first nations and the Inuit.
As a result of these discussions, we are calling on the government to contribute financial resources to identify the locations that may have been the site of the same horrors as in Kamloops. We are calling on the government to push the religious communities that participated in the residential school system to give access to their archives. Furthermore, we are demanding that a monument for residential schools be constructed in Ottawa, in collaboration with the Algonquin nation.
These actions will not erase the generations of violence, inhumanity and shame, but they do represent a step forward. This is what indigenous peoples are recommending and what we must do together.
View Yvonne Jones Profile
Lib. (NL)
View Yvonne Jones Profile
2021-06-21 14:18 [p.8845]
Mr. Speaker, today we honour the rich cultures and traditions of first nations, Inuit and Métis across Canada. We also recognize this National Indigenous Peoples Day is occurring at a time that is very difficult. Many of us are deeply heartbroken learning of the unmarked remains of children at the former residential school near Kamloops.
This National Indigenous History Month is dedicated to the missing children who went to residential school and never came home. It is dedicated to their families and to all residential school survivors.
While today we recognize the historic and ongoing contributions of indigenous people to our country, we also take the time to educate ourselves about the hard truths of our past, acknowledge the ongoing impacts of racist colonial policies and the realities of current systemic racism.
We encourage all Canadians to read or reread the Truth and Reconciliation Commission's calls to action, as they are a road map to reconciliation, a road map that is supported by indigenous people, by our government and hopefully by all Canadians.
View Yves-François Blanchet Profile
BQ (QC)
Mr. Speaker, I am at at the Maison amérindienne de Mont‑Saint‑Hilaire. There have been discussions among the parties and if you seek it I believe you will find unanimous consent for the following motion:
That the House, recognizing the importance of historical truth in the process of healing grieving families and nations, insist that the government deploy, for the benefit of indigenous communities, the financial resources necessary to carry out every call to action in the Truth and Reconciliation Commission in order for indigenous communities to have the technical and scientific means and the project management necessary for the identification of sites and the establishment of registers, as well as for historical research and the commemoration of the victims;
That the House ask the government, in consultation with affected indigenous communities, to place the new information that would be collected for the purpose of finding all the missing children under the aegis of the National Centre for Truth and Reconciliation, all under the authority of the indigenous people;
That the House recognize that Ottawa is located on the traditional territory of the Algonquin people and, acting accordingly, affirm that it is urgent that call to action number 82 of the Truth and Reconciliation Commission, providing for the construction of a national monument to residential schools, be erected in Ottawa and reiterate that it is essential that all recognized national indigenous organizations be involved in the process, as they should; and finally,
That the House ask the federal government to push all religious communities that participated in the residential school system to give access to the relevant archives to researchers, to indigenous communities, and to survivors and their families.
View Yves-François Blanchet Profile
BQ (QC)
Mr. Speaker, there has been consultation between the parties, and I think you will find unanimous consent for the following motion.
I move:
That the House, recognizing the importance of historical truth in the process of healing grieving families and nations, insist that the government deploy, for the benefit of indigenous communities, the financial resources necessary to carry out every call to action in the truth and reconciliation Commission in order for indigenous communities to have the technical and scientific means and the project management necessary for the identification of sites and the establishment of registers, as well as for historical research and the commemoration of the victims;
That the House ask the government, in consultation with affected indigenous communities, to place the new information that would be collected for the purpose of finding all the missing children under the aegis of the National Centre for Truth and Reconciliation, all under the authority of the indigenous people;
That the House recognize that Ottawa is located on the traditional territory of the Algonquin people and, acting accordingly, affirm that it is urgent that call to action number 82 of the Truth and Reconciliation Commission, providing for the construction of a national monument to residential schools, be erected in Ottawa and reiterate that it is essential that all recognized national indigenous organizations be involved in the process, as they should; and finally,
That the House ask the federal government to push all religious communities that participated in the residential school system to give access to the relevant archives to researchers, to indigenous communities, and to survivors and their families.
View Anthony Rota Profile
Lib. (ON)
All those opposed to the hon. member moving the motion will please say nay.
The House has heard the terms of the motion. All those opposed to the motion will please say nay.
View Paul Manly Profile
GP (BC)
View Paul Manly Profile
2021-06-21 17:43 [p.8874]
Madam Speaker, it is an honour to table a second petition on National Indigenous Peoples Day in Canada. The petitioners note that indigenous people have rights and title to their traditional territories and have been stewards of these lands since time immemorial.
First nations and indigenous land defenders are calling for the protection of the remaining 2.7% of the original high productivity old growth forests in British Columbia, 75% of which are slated to be logged.
The petitioners call upon the government to work with the provinces and the first nations to immediately halt logging of endangered old-growth ecosystems; fund the long-term protection of old-growth ecosystems as a priority for Canada's climate action plan and reconciliation with indigenous peoples; support value-added forestry initiatives in partnership with first nations to ensure Canada's forestry industry is sustainable and based on the harvesting of second and third growth forests; ban the export of raw logs and maximize resource use for local jobs; and ban the use of whole trees for wood pellet biofuel production.
View Anthony Rota Profile
Lib. (ON)
I have the honour to inform the House that a communication has been received as follows:
Rideau Hall
Ottawa
June 21, 2021
Mr. Speaker:
I have the honour to inform you that the Right Honourable Richard Wagner, Administrator of the Government of Canada, signified royal assent by written declaration to the bills listed in the schedule to this letter on the 21st day of June, 2021, at 6:35 p.m.
Yours sincerely,
Ian McCowan
Secretary to the Governor General
The schedule indicates the bills assented to were Bill C-210, An Act to amend the Canada Revenue Agency Act (organ and tissue donors); Bill C-8, An Act to amend the Citizenship Act (Truth and Reconciliation Commission of Canada's call to action number 94); Bill C-15, An Act respecting the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples; Bill C-33, An Act for granting to Her Majesty certain sums of money for the federal public administration for the fiscal year ending March 31, 2022; and Bill C-34, An Act for granting to Her Majesty certain sums of money for the federal public administration for the fiscal year ending March 31, 2022.
View Paul Manly Profile
GP (BC)
View Paul Manly Profile
2021-06-22 0:46 [p.8929]
Mr. Speaker, it is an honour and privilege to rise again tonight to speak to Bill C-10. It is always an honour to speak from the unceded traditional territory of the Snuneymuxw First Nation, and to serve the community of Nanaimo—Ladysmith within the traditional territory of the Snaw-naw-as, Snuneymuxw, Stz'uminus and Lyackson First Nations. Hych'ka Siem. It is National Aboriginal Peoples Day today, a day to celebrate the rich cultural heritage, the languages, the governance structure and the traditions of the indigenous people of Canada.
I spoke to many organizations about this bill. As an independent party called the Greens, we do not have the same ability to question witnesses in committee, so I held my own meetings and asked my own questions. One of the meetings I had was with APTN and indigenous producers. I want to talk tonight about the importance of indigenous voices in our broadcasting system. If we left this content up to the United States, our views of indigenous people would continue to be the Disneyfied view seen in Pocahontas and spaghetti westerns. It is really important that indigenous voices are heard.
In the early 1990s, my father found a letter written by a woman in 1898 named Elizabeth Shaw. She wrote a scathing 18-page letter about the residential school system and the abuses that were happening at the Port Simpson school. We made a documentary film about her and a number of indigenous people were involved with it.
Afterward, indigenous people told me about some of the other experiences they had and they wanted to make films as well. I said that it was not really for me to tell their story. That is what they should be doing and I helped facilitate it. I worked with a lot of indigenous producers, young people and older people. These people were interested in getting into media production, and I facilitated training and mentorship so they could tell their stories.
What came out of that? I worked with a young guy, Don Claxton. I worked with his sister Dana Claxton as well, who is an indigenous artist, and played music with their sister, Kim Soo Goodtrack. They had an idea for a show. That was in the late 1990s and, lo and behold, APTN, the Aboriginal Peoples Television Network, was born. We produced a pilot for the first preschool show on APTN. I worked with them, a whole bunch of first nations and an indigenous technical crew, who we trained, to create 64 episodes of a show called Wakanheja.
The idea behind CanCon is to hear these important indigenous voices. We need to make sure that the independent producers creating Canadian content have access to the Canada Media Fund when they are producing for social media streamers like Netflix and others, rather than just for the Canadian broadcasters, because that is where a lot of this production is going.
I heard a lot of discussion about freedom of expression and that some YouTubers have to go down because Canadian content goes up, that somebody has to go down because somebody is going up. I do not know how many times I heard that at committee during filibusters. A Conservative member gave a great example of somebody they know who does coupon clipping and gives how-tos, and that is great. I looked at the top 100 Canadian YouTube producers and there were people doing nails, gaming commentators and spoof videos. There was lots of content that could be produced anywhere. People knew it was Canadian because they would drop an “eh”, say “get 'er done” or say “about” wrong, but that is not what the idea behind CanCon is all about.
This commercial content drives advertising dollars, and that is what the commercial Internet giants are all about: selling advertising. That is what the algorithms are designed to do. What is important in CanCon is indigenous voices, stories from Canada's north, Canadian documentaries, stories of new Canadians and emerging Canadian musicians. These are the programs that need to be discoverable, and that is what discoverability is about. It is about learning about each other and about Canadian stories, not being inundated by American culture or the dominant culture.
I missed my late show tonight. I want to talk about a Canadian story that needs to be shared and understood. In recent decades, Canadians have learned more and more about our former government's attempt to commit cultural genocide, to commit genocide, to wipe out indigenous cultures through the residential school system. The Truth and Reconciliation Commission has reported extensively and provided a path forward with 94 calls to action.
What most Canadians are unaware of is a parallel set of institutions, the racially segregated Indian hospital system operated by the federal government between the 1940s and 1970s, and those hospitals have their own horror stories. I first heard about the Nanaimo Indian Hospital about 15 years ago, and many people in my community have no idea it ever existed.
In 2013, I was commissioned to produce a film for the Hul'qumi'num Health Hub about cultural safety in the health care system within the Hul'qumi'num speaking areas. Part of that film was to give health professionals an understanding of the history of institutional racism in health care and why indigenous people did not seek help when they needed medical attention.
I interviewed elders who spoke about the trauma they experienced in the Nanaimo Indian Hospital. I heard about painful treatments and I heard about people going into the hospital who were never heard from again. As part of the research for the film, I spoke with researcher Laurie Meijer Drees, who is the co-chair of the First Nations Studies Department at Vancouver Island University. She has documented the oral stories of people who have been in these hospitals, and wrote a book entitled Healing Histories: Stories from Canada's Indian Hospitals.
Of course, not all these stories were bad. Some people went to the hospital sick, were given antibiotics and returned home feeling better, but the horrific legacy of the Indian hospitals was based on treating all indigenous people as wards of the state. Consent for medical treatment only came into being for the general public in the 1960s. However, as wards of the state, indigenous people were not asked to consent for their hospitalization or treatment. The system patronizingly viewed them as lacking the capacity to give consent.
An indigenous person could be arrested by the RCMP for not going to the hospital if instructed to do so by a doctor. That twisted, racist mentality facilitated and led to women being sterilized without giving consent and patients being subject to experiments with medication without their prior knowledge.
These hospitals were underfunded and understaffed. Family members and communities were not updated on loved ones in the hospital. People died, children were shipped off to residential school or adopted out and family members were never informed. Some children were taken to hospital and years later no longer knew who they were, what their real names were or where they came from.
Most of what is known about this dark history comes from oral accounts told to researchers and shared through the Truth and Reconciliation Commission, but the medical files are locked and researchers have not been granted permission to access them. Apparently the reason given is that those records contain personal information. It is important to protect personal information, however, we do not need to expose personal information to get to the bottom of what happened.
To heal from those past traumas, we need to know the truth. The truth is sealed in those medical records, and it is incumbent upon the government to give researchers and independent adjudicators appropriate clearance, access and analysis of this data to conduct a full independent inquiry. I am looking forward to a first nations producer, an indigenous producer, creating a documentary about this and having members of this place finding this through discoverability on YouTube. These are stories we need to hear. These are the truths we need to hear. We also need to hear about the rich cultural heritage of indigenous people.
Let us talk about censorship. We are worried about censorship. The real concern about censorship is these large corporations. On May 5, red dress day, the National Day of Awareness for Missing and Murdered Indigenous Women and Girls, family, friends and loved ones were posting about their missing loved ones. Thousands of those posts disappeared.
Right here in my community, I know Lisa Marie Young went missing years ago. What happened to all these posts? They were all pulled by Instagram. This is happening with other things like Black Lives Matter, Israel and Palestine, Sheikh Jarrah and SOS Colombia. I heard one of the Conservatives say that their posts were missing, right-wing posts, but this is clearly not Conservative posts.
Freedom of speech is important to me and we need to uphold it, and this bill would do that.
View Paul Manly Profile
GP (BC)
View Paul Manly Profile
2021-06-18 12:34 [p.8781]
Mr. Speaker, it is an honour to present this petition today. This is part of a large stack I have, with over 15,000 signatures now. People are really concerned about the trashing of the last remaining old growth forests in British Columbia, with less than 3% left.
The petitioners call on the government to work with the province and first nations to follow through on our international commitments to protect biodiversity and to save these forests as part of our climate action plan and reconciliation with first nations; to refocus on second and third growth forests with value-added logging; to stop the export of raw logs; to stop the grinding up of whole trees for biofuel pellets; and to protect our old growth forests.
View Paul Manly Profile
GP (BC)
View Paul Manly Profile
2021-06-17 10:28 [p.8635]
Mr. Speaker, on Vancouver Island, people are very concerned about the loss of endangered, old-growth ecosystems. In British Columbia, we are down to the last 3% of these magnificent forests.
The petitioners call on the federal government to work with the province and first nations to immediately halt the logging of endangered old-growth ecosystems; fund the long-term protection of old-growth ecosystems as a priority for Canada's climate action plan and reconciliation with indigenous peoples; support value-added forestry initiatives in partnership with first nations to ensure Canada's forest industry is sustainable and based on the harvesting of second and third growth forests, something that many petitioners agree with; ban the export of raw logs and maximize resource use for local jobs; and ban the use of whole trees for wood pellet biofuel production.
View Peter Julian Profile
NDP (BC)
Mr. Speaker, I just want to say that I am coming to you from the traditional unceded territory of the QayQayt First Nation and the Coast Salish peoples. I thank them for this privilege.
I would like to start off by paying tribute to frontline workers, health care workers and emergency responders across the country. We have seen over the last 15 months, as our country has entered into this unparalleled health crisis, incredible bravery and incredible dedication on behalf of all those Canadians who have tried to keep us alive and well, and who continue to serve us during this pandemic.
Now, we can look, and there is a potential light at the end of the tunnel, as we start to see, slowly, the number of infections going down. We still have much work to do, there is no doubt, but we can start to envisage what kind of society we can actually build post-COVID.
I do that from my background as a financial administrator. As members know, I started out my adult working life as a factory worker and eventually was able to save up enough money to go back to school and learn about finances and financial management. I was able, fortunately, to use that in a variety of social enterprises and organizations.
The one thing I learned that is fundamental, when we talk about financial administration, is that we have to follow the money to see what the priorities of a social enterprise, business or organization are. What the priorities are is often dictated by where the flow of money goes. In this debate and this discussion around the main estimates and where we are as a country, it is fundamentally important to ask the question “Where is the money flowing to?” That is why this main estimates process and this debate tonight are so fundamentally important.
As members well know, in our corner of the House, and this dates back to the time of Tommy Douglas, within the NDP we have always believed that it is fundamentally important to make sure that those who are the wealthiest in society pay their fair share. Tommy Douglas was able to, in the first democratic socialist government in North America, actually put in place universal health care. He was able to do that because he put in place a fair tax system.
We can look at the NDP governments since that time. I am certainly not telling tales out of school. As members are well aware, the federal ministry of finance is not a hotbed of New Democrats. However, the federal ministries of finance have consistently, over the last decades, acknowledged that NDP governments have been the best in terms of balancing budgets and providing services for people. That is the same approach that we will take, one day, to provide the type of stewardship that we believe is fundamental to renewing our country, providing the supports, and building a society where everyone matters.
Let us look at where the current government stands, in terms of that flow of money. Prior to the budget, we put forward, and it should have been reflected in the estimates process, a variety of smart ideas that other countries have already incorporated as we go through this pandemic. We believe that we should be putting into place, as other countries have done, a wealth tax. We should be saying to the billionaires and the ultrarich of this country that they have to pay their fair share. They benefited from this pandemic and their wealth has increased, and now they have to give some of that back, to make sure that we all have the wherewithal to move forward.
We also proposed a pandemic profits tax, because we have seen in previous crises, like the Second World War, that putting that type of practice into place ensures that companies maintain the same profit levels but are not profiting unduly from the suffering that so many people have experienced through COVID-19.
We have also been foremost with regard to cracking down on overseas tax havens. As members know, I have spoken out about this. The member for Burnaby South, our national leader, the member for Hamilton Centre and the rest of the NDP caucus have been vociferous in this regard because these lose an astounding amount of taxpayers' money every year. They are the result of both Conservative actions and Liberal actions.
The Parliamentary Budget Officer pointed out two years ago that Canadians lose $25 billion every year to overseas tax havens. That $25 billion could meet an enormous amount of need. It could serve in job creation or the transition to a clean energy economy. All of those things could be accomplished, but what we see is an intricate network of tax havens that has built up over the years because of both Conservative and Liberal government decisions. The cost to Canadians is profoundly strong when we think of $25 billion a year in taxpayers' money being lost to overseas tax havens.
When we couple that $25 billion with a pandemic profits tax, which the Parliamentary Budget Officer evaluated at $8 billion, and a wealth tax, which would bring in $10 billion a year, we start to see what financial underpinnings could be put into place to actually meet the needs of Canadians across the country. We often see that there is a flow of money to the ultrarich: the wealthiest banks and billionaires in this country. At the same time, we often see that those who have the most critical needs do not even get a trickle of that financial flow.
At the beginning of this crisis, where did the government decide to flow its money? We know this now. This is no secret. In fact, the Liberal government seems to be proud of this fact. Within four days of the pandemic hitting in Canada, an astounding, unbelievable, record amount of $750 billion was made available in liquidity supports to Canada's big banks through a variety of mechanisms and federal institutions: OSFI, the CMHC and the Bank of Canada. That is $750 billion. It is unparalleled in our history and unprecedented.
If we go back to the Harper government, there were criticisms at that time because during the global financial crisis $116 billion in liquidity support was provided to the banking sector. Of course the banking sector prospered enormously from it, but $750 billion is so difficult to get our minds around. It is a vast amount of money. It is a colossal flow of an unprecedented amount of cash in liquidity supports to the banking sector.
The banks have responded accordingly. There were no conditions attached. They jacked up their service fees, as so many Canadians know. They did not reduce their interest rates to zero, as we saw in the credit union movement. Credit unions, such as Community Savings Credit Union in Vancouver, reduced their line of credit interest to zero and their credit card rates to zero because they knew Canadians were suffering. Canadians had to struggle to put food on the table, and the credit union sector in many respects responded to that, but the banking sector did not. It just kept seeing that money roll in. During the pandemic, its profits have been $60 billion so far. It is unbelievable.
I pointed out earlier that there is no pandemic profits tax and there is no wealth tax. Canada's billionaires have increased their wealth during this pandemic by an astounding $80 billion, yet there are no measures for any sort of fairness or to make sure the ultrarich pay their fair share. We can follow the money and see, with the Liberal government, that as we went through an unprecedented crisis its first and foremost thought was for the banks and billionaires of this country. This is unique in the responses of governments through crises in the past.
During the Second World War when we needed to win the battle against Nazism and fascism, the federal government put into place an excess profits tax and wealth taxes to ensure that we had the wherewithal to win the war effort. After the Second World War, we were able to build an unprecedented amount of public housing, hospitals and educational institutions across the country and to build the transportation sector. The country boomed in so many respects because the investments were there starting with a fair tax system, but not this time. There is no wealth tax, no pandemic profits tax and no cracking down on overseas tax havens.
What did the NDP do? We hear rumours that the Prime Minister desperately wants to call an election, and we will all be asked what we did during the pandemic.
Under the leadership of the member for Burnaby South, the NDP went to work immediately. We saw the huge amounts of money that were made available to the banking sector right off the bat, and we started pushing for an emergency response benefit that could lift people above the poverty line. We forced and pushed because we had seen from the best examples of other countries that we needed to put in a place a 75% wage subsidy. We pushed hard, as members know, to make that a reality.
The track record is very clear. We pushed in the House of Commons for supports for students, seniors and people with disabilities, with the big caveat that the Liberal government never put in place wholesale supports for all people with disabilities. It has now asked them to wait three years before there is any hope of support. People with disabilities will have to wait three years while banks had to wait four days in the midst of a pandemic. That is the national tragedy we see with the flow of money going to the ultrarich, the wealthiest, to make sure that banks and billionaires benefit first.
New Democrats fought those fights and won many of them over the course of the past year. I know that has made a difference. We still see suffering. We still see people lining up at food banks in unprecedented numbers. Tragically we still see people with disabilities who are barely getting by. Tragically we still see people closing, for the last time, the doors of businesses that they may have devoted their lives to building up. These are community businesses that served the public and created jobs in communities across this country, but in so many cases those small businesses have had to close their doors. Nothing could be more tragic.
As we come out of such a profound crisis, we see many people being left behind; however, the government has put forward a budget that slashes the CERB benefits even more. The CRB was slashed from $500 a week to $300 a week, which is below the poverty level. We see the government responding to the economic crisis of seniors by saying that those over 75 get a top-up on their OAS to lift them up to the poverty line, but those under 75 are out of luck with the government.
That contrasts vividly with the government paying out money through the wage subsidy to profitable companies that then paid huge executive bonuses or often paid dividends to their investors. The government says that is okay, despite the NDP's warnings from the very beginning that it had to put measures into place. It is not a problem: It will recover money elsewhere, but then it slashes the CERB benefits for people who need them the most.
What does this mean, in terms of an estimates process, and how would the NDP approach the issue of making sure we meet the needs of Canadians and respond to the crisis that so many people are living through in this country? As I have already mentioned, New Democrats would tackle it from the revenue side. We would make sure that the ultrarich pay their fair share. We would crack down on overseas tax havens. The government never introduced a single piece of legislation that adequately responded to the crisis in financing we see with the hemorrhaging of $25 billion a year to overseas tax havens.
The CRA was before the finance committee last week. The year before, I asked who had been prosecuted in the Panama papers, the Bahama papers, the Paradise papers and the Isle of Man scam. A year ago, CRA was forced to say it had never prosecuted anybody. This year I asked the same question, and the result was exactly the same. No company and no individual has ever been prosecuted. We have thousands of names of people who have been using these particular strategies to not pay taxes, yet the CRA has never had the tools in place to take them on.
New Democrats would make sure that everyone pays their fair share, that the ultrarich actually pay their fair share, that billionaires do not get off scot free and that the companies that try to take their earnings overseas have to pay income tax and corporate tax. We would make sure of that.
What would we do in the estimates? What would an NDP estimates process look like? We have already seen signs of that over the past year. We have been tabling legislation, bringing forward bills and making sure that we actually put into place the programs Canadians need.
Members will recall I tabled Bill C-213, the Canada pharmacare act, ably supported by my colleagues for Vancouver Kingsway and Vancouver East. We brought that to a vote with the support of 100,000 Canadians who had written to their members of Parliament. Liberals and Conservatives voted that down, even though we know pharmacare is something that will make a huge difference in the quality of life for Canadians. It is estimated that 10 million Canadians cannot pay for their medication. Hundreds die every year because they cannot afford their medication. For thousands of others, families are forced to choose between putting food on the table and paying for their medication. We can end that suffering. At the same time the Parliamentary Budget Officer, that independent officer of Parliament who can tell us with such accuracy what the net impacts of policies are, has told us we would save about $4 billion overall as a people. We would be able to reduce the costs of medications, so the estimates process would include universal public pharmacare in this country.
As we saw with the member for St. John's East just last night, we would be bringing in dental care for all those who do not have access to dental care. Why is that important? We heard yesterday about a person in Sioux Lookout, Ontario, who passed away because they did not have the financial ability to pay for the dental work that was vitally important for them to be able to eat. These are tragedies that are repeated so often in this country.
What else would we see in the estimates? The guaranteed livable basic income was brought to the House of Commons by the member for Winnipeg Centre. We have seen how so many members of our caucus have fought for the rights of indigenous peoples. It should be a source of shame for the government that dozens of indigenous communities still do not have safe drinking water, six years after the Prime Minister's promise. As the member for Burnaby South said in response to a question from a journalist, how would we ever accept the cities of Toronto, Vancouver or Montreal not having safe drinking water? It is simply astounding, yet we have no wealth tax or pandemic profit tax in place. We have no set of priorities that allows us to ensure that all communities in this country have safe drinking water.
We saw the incredible tragedy of the genocide in residential schools. There are first nations communities that do not have the funding to find their missing, murdered, dead and disappeared children. This has to be a national priority as part of reconciliation. It cannot simply be pretty words. We have to act, and that means ensuring that when we say “follow the money”, it is no longer the very wealthy or ultrarich who receive the vast majority of federal funds, but the people across this country, indigenous peoples, who get the supports that they need and the quality of life they deserve.
There is the issue of the right to housing. Again, it would be part of our estimates to ensure that all Canadians have roofs over their heads at night. This is not rocket science. It takes investment. Other countries have had the right to housing instilled. In a country with a climate as cold as Canada's, housing should be a fundamental right of every Canadian.
We would provide supports to peoples with disabilities, students and seniors. People have been struggling through this pandemic, yet students are still paying their student loans, seniors are being denied the increased OAS if they are under age 75 and people with disabilities are being asked to wait three years. The Prime Minister wants to pump $20 billion into the TMX pipeline instead of investing in clean energy that would result in hundreds of thousands of new jobs.
The estimates process with an NDP government would be different and better. We will continue to fight for a country where no one is left behind.
View Paul Manly Profile
GP (BC)
View Paul Manly Profile
2021-06-16 16:25 [p.8540]
Mr. Speaker, it is an honour to table a petition initiated by constituents in Nanaimo—Ladysmith. It is the 29th petition of this nature.
The petitioners are deeply concerned about protecting British Columbia's endangered old-growth forest from clear-cut logging. They know that old-growth forests provide immeasurable benefits, including carbon sequestration, biodiversity, and cultural, recreational and educational value.
The petitioners call upon the Government of Canada to work with the province and first nations to immediately halt the logging of endangered old-growth ecosystems, fund the long-term protection of old-growth ecosystems as a priority of Canada's climate action plan and reconciliation with indigenous peoples, support value-added forestry initiatives in partnership with first nations to ensure Canada's forestry industry is sustainable based on the harvesting of second- and third-growth forests, ban the export of raw logs, maximize resource use for local jobs and ban the use of whole trees for wood pellet biofuel production.
View Elizabeth May Profile
GP (BC)
View Elizabeth May Profile
2021-06-15 10:14 [p.8428]
Mr. Speaker, the second petition speaks to an issue that we have heard about in this House frequently in recent weeks, and that is the critical declining area of our forests comprising old-growth forests. The petitioners note that there are solutions to protecting what is left. Less than 2.7% of British Columbia forests, for example, are in old-growth condition. Old growth fosters biodiversity, and it is a major sink for carbon. It could be part of Canada's federal plans for protecting biodiversity, protecting carbon and keeping it out of the atmosphere.
The petitioners note that solutions in value-added forest products, in collaboration with first nations, could create part of our path to reconciliation while preserving old-growth forests. In short, the petitioners call for a halt on all old-growth logging across Canada.
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