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Results: 31 - 45 of 131
View Chrystia Freeland Profile
Lib. (ON)
View Chrystia Freeland Profile
2015-02-02 13:22 [p.10900]
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Mr. Speaker, the hon. member has an important point. I very much agree with him that this hits the fundamental issue of trust and transparency.
A lot of our discussion today feels as if it were some kind of cheap detective novel or divorce case, a he-said versus she-said issue, as we parse exactly what the email did and did not contain and what the intentions of the different parties were. That is not the way a healthy federation works. There should not be this sort of fight between a federal government and the provinces if the government has a good, healthy, trust-based relationships with them. This is essential for Canada to function.
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View Chrystia Freeland Profile
Lib. (ON)
View Chrystia Freeland Profile
2015-02-02 13:24 [p.10900]
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Mr. Speaker, with all due respect, the quote cited by the hon. member misses the point. There is no dispute between the federal government and Newfoundland and Labrador about the overall benefits of CETA. Indeed, there is no dispute between the party opposite and my own about the overall benefits of CETA. We believe that it is essential for Canada to have a trade deal with the European Union. Our only disappointment is that there seem to be a lot more announcements and big, expensive parties than actual done deals.
When it comes to the conduct of the Province of Newfoundland and Labrador, my concern is that we are hearing from the elected representatives of that province in the clearest most direct and most aggrieved terms that they feel betrayed by the federal government. I think the people who need to come to the table today and fix this relationship are the members opposite and the federal government.
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View Chrystia Freeland Profile
Lib. (ON)
View Chrystia Freeland Profile
2015-02-02 13:27 [p.10900]
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Mr. Speaker, I thank my hon. colleague for his excellent question. As many in the House know, he has a long-standing and deep interest and expertise in all of Canada's waterways.
I raised the issue of Prince Rupert precisely because it is symptomatic of the high-handed, my-way-or-the-highway conduct of the current government, which we are again seeing manifested in this dispute with Newfoundland and Labrador. As my hon. colleague rightly points out, we have an excellent diplomatic service and an excellent ambassador in the United States. However, his hands are tied because the only message he is allowed to deliver is, “We're going to do it my way.” That kind of behaviour, those kinds of ideological blinders, and that kind of rhetoric is not working in our relationship with the United States and, I am sad to say, it is not working in Ottawa's relationship with the provinces. It is time for a change.
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View Chrystia Freeland Profile
Lib. (ON)
View Chrystia Freeland Profile
2015-02-02 13:29 [p.10901]
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Mr. Speaker, the history that my hon. colleague cites has provided ample proof of why Canada's provinces today do not feel they have a counterparty in Ottawa that wants to work with them, that wants to co-operate with them, and even whose written word can be trusted.
It is absurd and embarrassing that we in the House are reduced to parsing emails and letters between a province and the federal government to try to prove what exactly was meant. That shows a complete breakdown of the relationship.
That relationship is the core of what we are talking about today. It is a duty of the federal Government of Canada to have good, productive, effective relationships with the provinces, particularly when it comes to presenting a united Canadian front and negotiating trade deals. I am sorry to say that the government has failed in doing that.
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View Chrystia Freeland Profile
Lib. (ON)
View Chrystia Freeland Profile
2015-01-28 14:46 [p.10735]
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Mr. Speaker, Canada is united in support of democratic Ukraine, but Canada's actions must match our rhetoric. Sergey Chemezov is a close friend of Putin's from their days in the KGB and he is now the chief of a leading Russian defence company. He has been sanctioned by the U.S. and Europe, but he is not on Canada's list. Igor Sechin, another member of Putin's inner circle sanctioned by the U.S., is still welcome in Canada too.
Could the Minister of Foreign Affairs explain why these two close Putin comrades are banned by our allies, but not by Canada?
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View Chrystia Freeland Profile
Lib. (ON)
View Chrystia Freeland Profile
2015-01-27 16:12 [p.10707]
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Mr. Speaker, I will be splitting my time with the member for York West.
Thank you for giving me this opportunity to participate in this important debate, Mr. Speaker.
It is the fundamental responsibility of the federal government to instill a sense of confidence in the economy. This is why we need a budget now. This delay is causing uncertainty in the markets and in the minds of Canadians. The Prime Minister has put all his eggs in one basket and now, when economic growth is slowing down and oil prices are falling, it is obvious that he has no plan B. Last week, the Bank of Canada acted, but the Prime Minister is improvising as he goes along, cancelling meetings with our leading trading partners and allies and delaying the introduction of the budget.
By delaying the tabling of the budget, the Prime Minister has thrown up his hands and admitted he has no plan B. Canada’s economic prosperity is at stake, but the Prime Minister is asking middle-class families to make even more sacrifices so that the wealthiest members of our society can get billions of dollars in tax cuts.
Who is the Prime Minister working for these days? His main priority during this difficult period is to protect the gift of more than $2 billion that he gave to the Canadians who need it the least. The Conservatives should start by reversing course on the income-splitting plan, which will cost the government $2 billion a year, and is a tax cut for the middle class that will mainly benefit the wealthiest families in Canada.
During the 2011 election campaign, the Prime Minister promised that when the budget was balanced, his government would let families split their incomes for tax purposes, up to a maximum of $50,000. On October 30, 2014, the government announced a slightly modified plan offering families a theoretical tax credit for income splitting that could reach up to $2,000. This means that 85% of Canadian households will not benefit from income splitting, among them single-parent families, parents with similar incomes and families that have no children under 18. In most cases, the $2,000 maximum benefit will be paid to households where only one person is earning an income, where that income is higher than $100,000 a year.
This program will cost the government $2.4 billion over the 2014-15 fiscal year, and $2 billion a year over the following years.
We need leadership with an intelligent plan to expand our economy in all sectors and in all regions, for all Canadians. The Liberal Party’s priority is clear: we have to improve the security and prosperity of middle-class Canadians who have not seen a decent increase in their incomes for 30 years. Canadian families deserve to have a real and fair chance to succeed.
In its economic vision, this government has failed to take into account what has always made Canada a prosperous country: diversity, balance and partnership among regions and economic sectors.
Canada’s strength should not depend on one thing or one place. It comes from the diversity of its population and the diversity of its economy. Yes, we need the strength of western Canada, but we also need the strength of eastern Canada, the strength of northern Canada and the strength of central Canada.
I would like to thank my colleagues, and particularly the francophone members, for having to listen to my bad French, and I hope it was understandable.
I will continue in English. I thank members for their tolerance. As an anglophone MP representing an anglophone riding, I do apologize for murdering the language of Balzac, but it is important to try. Balzac, by the way, had a Ukrainian wife, so I feel especially close to him.
One of my favourite commentators on the economy is Warren Buffett. In his 2001 letter to shareholders, he had this great line, “Only when the tide goes out do you discover who's been swimming naked.”
In Canada, the tide has gone out. That is what has happened to the government. Now that we see that there is no tide, it is not that pretty. The economic tide that flattered Canada's relative economic performance consisted primarily of two things: high commodity prices, and the fact that Canada alone, of the G7 countries, avoided the financial crisis, thanks, it might be worth noting, to the very wise and prudent decisions, against the conventional wisdom, of the Liberal government to maintain tough banking regulation.
That tide has now gone out because, first of all, the high commodity prices that flattered our economic performance have collapsed, particularly of oil, and the financial crisis that devastated the other G7 countries and really flattered Canada's relative economic performance has now started to abate and is not hitting the other G7 countries so badly.
Particularly in relative terms, we are seeing the true reality of Canada's economic performance and the true reality of the government's economic stewardship. What we are seeing is a government that has failed to understand the central economic challenge of our generation, which is that of adjusting to the new realities of the 21st century economy, the realities of an economy in the age of a technology revolution and globalization.
What is happening in this 21st century economy is a relentless hollowing out of the middle class. We are seeing middle class wages, over the past 30 years, stagnate at the same time that wages and wealth at the very top are increasing.
The government, for years, has been in denial about this. In fact, when the leader of the Liberal Party first started talking about the hollowed-out middle-class, we were met with derision and denial. It is now becoming a truth universally acknowledged that this issue of income inequality and the hollowed out middle class is the central economic challenge, and we have to address it.
I am just going to read a final quote from the World Economic Forum in Davos, not generally seen as a hotbed of pinkos or Communists. This is what they have to say about income inequality:
Across rich and poor countries alike, this inequality is fuelling conflict, corroding democracies and damaging growth itself. Not long ago those who worried about inequality were accused of partaking in the politics of envy. In the past year this concern officially became mainstream as voices from the Pope to Christine Lagarde...cautioned of its impacts. The mounting consensus: left unchecked, economic inequality will set back the fight against poverty and threaten global stability.
Instead of pushing against these economic forces, the government, particularly with its imprudent and unfair income-splitting plan, is exacerbating them. That is why we support the opposition motion.
Let us have a budget. Come clean. The tide is out. We want to see what the government guys have.
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View Chrystia Freeland Profile
Lib. (ON)
View Chrystia Freeland Profile
2015-01-27 16:23 [p.10709]
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Mr. Speaker, the question of the gender impact of income splitting is an excellent one. One of our big concerns with income splitting should be the fairness issue, particularly at a time when we are discovering that the fiscal constraints are greater than we thought. To be giving a tax break to the Canadians who need it least is absolutely unconscionable. It not only makes bad economic sense, it is also just wrong.
The gender impact is significant too. Income splitting discourages married women from entering the workforce. As a working married mother, I think that is something that our economic policy should not be ideologically slanted toward. Countries like Sweden and provinces like Quebec have found that if we do the opposite, if we have economic policies that encourage maximum female labour force participation, there is a measurable improvement in GDP and in tax take.
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View Chrystia Freeland Profile
Lib. (ON)
View Chrystia Freeland Profile
2015-01-27 16:26 [p.10709]
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Mr. Speaker, I thank the hon. member opposite for his question but I disagree 100% with the premise.
All of the calculations show that income splitting would disproportionately benefit Canadians at the very top of the income distribution. This benefit would go to the 15% of Canadians who least need it. Therefore, as a matter of economic fairness, income splitting is a really bad idea.
As a matter of sound economic policy it is a really bad idea too, because what we are learning about economic policy is that if we do not focus on growing the middle class, we will have slowing economic growth. If the middle class does not have the income to purchase, we have an economy that is stalled. An economic policy like income splitting that benefits the top is a policy that also has an adverse impact on GDP.
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View Chrystia Freeland Profile
Lib. (ON)
View Chrystia Freeland Profile
2015-01-26 14:41 [p.10580]
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Mr. Speaker, last week the Bank of Canada said that low oil prices will “weigh significantly on the Canadian economy.” The bank acted on its grave concerns by lowering rates to an astonishing 0.75%, yet the Minister of Finance has the gall to pretend, as he has done today, that the Canadian economy is in “a good space”. His actions belie his own words. Why else would he delay the budget?
When will the Conservatives come clean with Canadians and present a plan to stimulate growth and create jobs rather than cling to their imprudent and expensive tax cuts for the Canadians who need them the least?
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View Chrystia Freeland Profile
Lib. (ON)
View Chrystia Freeland Profile
2014-12-08 14:40 [p.10298]
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Mr. Speaker, government delays in finalizing CETA are putting the agreement at risk. Last month, France's national assembly and senate both passed non-binding anti-CETA motions. This weekend, the leader of the NDP poured fuel on the fire, attacking this essential agreement at a socialist conference in Paris.
Could the minister tell the House exactly what the government is doing to get this deal done, and when this much ballyhooed agreement will finally be completed?
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View Chrystia Freeland Profile
Lib. (ON)
View Chrystia Freeland Profile
2014-11-27 14:39 [p.9903]
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Mr. Speaker, the European Union and Ukraine have signed an association agreement that takes effect January 1, 2016. In the meantime, Europe has already eliminated most tariffs for Ukraine, a form of help equal to $635 million in aid.
Canada and Ukraine are seeking a free trade agreement, but trade negotiations take a long time. Given the strong cross-party support for Ukraine in this House, will the government match the EU's unilateral zero-tariff regime for Ukrainian businesses until our deal is done?
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View Chrystia Freeland Profile
Lib. (ON)
View Chrystia Freeland Profile
2014-11-19 14:08 [p.9532]
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When I awoke
Before the dawn, amid their sleep I heard
My sons ...weep and ask
For bread.
Mr. Speaker, that is Dante's description of hell. That hell of starving children is what Stalin and his regime created in Ukraine in 1932 and 1933. This Holodomor was a deliberate genocide, designed to break the Ukrainian nation and to impose collectivization on a farming society renowned for its industriousness and powerful sense of community. One of the horrors of the Holodomor was that Moscow flatly denied its murderous campaign. Far too many people, for far too long, believed that lie.
Walter Duranty, The New York Times journalist who won a Pulitzer prize for his reporting from the Soviet Union, wrote:
Conditions are bad, but there is no famine.... But—to put it brutally—you can't make an omelet without breaking eggs.
Today, we are again hearing Orwellian doublespeak from a Kremlin that has invaded Ukraine. That makes its doubly important for the House to recognize the Holodomor as an act of genocide and to remember its victims. Vichna im pamiat.
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View Chrystia Freeland Profile
Lib. (ON)
View Chrystia Freeland Profile
2014-11-18 14:37 [p.9465]
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Mr. Speaker, many young Canadians have given up looking for full-time work in the face of stagnant wages and a dire job market. According to the Canadian Federation of Students, 300,000 young Canadians are actually working for free. When we add together discouraged young job seekers who are forced to work part time and unpaid interns, we get an unemployment and underemployment rate of almost 28%. That is shameful.
Why does the government have no plan for our lost generation of young Canadians?
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View Chrystia Freeland Profile
Lib. (ON)
View Chrystia Freeland Profile
2014-11-05 14:46 [p.9214]
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Mr. Speaker, according to the Bank of Canada, 200,000 young Canadians cannot get work. The situation is so dire, economists are joking that our central bank is following a grim new indicator: the kids living in their parents' basements index. In fact, it is so hard to get a job today that young people are being advised to work for free. This is our lost generation.
How can the government justify giving a tax break to wealthy boomers, while leaving Canada's young adults behind?
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View Chrystia Freeland Profile
Lib. (ON)
View Chrystia Freeland Profile
2014-11-04 14:43 [p.9177]
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Mr. Speaker, the Governor of the Bank of Canada warns that we are facing a low or zero-growth jobs recovery. He said that over 900,000 Canadians are trapped in part-time jobs and 200,000 young Canadians cannot get work at all. Governor Poloz is “pretty sure these kids have not taken early retirement”. He said that we need policies such as investment in infrastructure to boost growth.
Why is the government hamstringing its own capacity to act with an income splitting plan that offers no benefit to 86% of Canadians?
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