Tako Van Popta
Langley Township—Fraser Heights, British Columbia · Conservative · Canada
“Mr. Speaker, the reality is that the appeal process in British Columbia is going to take years. In the meantime, homeowners in Richmond, British Columbia, and throughout the province are feeling insecure. Here is the reality in the subject territory in Richmond.”
“Mr. Speaker, in Cowichan Tribes v. the Attorney General of Canada, the B.C. Supreme Court declared aboriginal title over private lands, and the private landowners, 150 of them, are worried.”
“Madam Speaker, earlier in debate tonight, we heard from the Liberal side of the House suggesting that anybody who was opposed to Bill C‑22 was fearmongering and spreading misinformation. However, the very rational debate coming from the member for Vancouver East would suggest otherwise.”
“Mr. Speaker, I thank the minister for her speech on this self-government agreement, which she says could inform future agreements. There is the Musqueam recognition rights agreement in Vancouver, which has become very controversial.”
“Mr. Speaker, while the high-flying Prime Minister is racking up a $1-million debt for luxury inflight catering, many Canadians are struggling just to put food on the table.”
“Mr. Speaker, earlier in the debate today, we heard the minister say that this agreement is a model to inform future treaties, yet the most recent treaty, the K'ómoks Treaty, which my colleague also mentioned, introduces the concept of UNDRIP, a foreign document. This is not made in Canada.”
The complete record
Every one of 218 lines we hold for Tako Van Popta, in date order, each linked to its source. Free to read, in full, without an account. Page 3 of 5.
“Mr. Speaker, under the Liberal government, the Canadian dream of home ownership is rapidly fading for young people. CMHC reports that housing construction is actually going to be down over the next three years by up to 18% compared to last year. Why do the Liberals not just adopt the Conservative plan to eliminate GST on all new housing construction of up to $1.3 million and help restore the dream of home ownership for young Canadians?”
“Mr. Speaker, indeed it is the government's job to implement these treaties. As the opposition, our job is to hold the government to account, as it is that member's responsibility as well. We need the Conservatives to form government. I am thinking of the Harper days when we actually got the job done. It can be done, and we are waiting for the government to finally take action to get the job done.”
“Mr. Speaker, I want to congratulate my colleague from Skeena—Bulkley Valley on the work he has done with the Haisla Nation and others in British Columbia for advancing indigenous reconciliation. I thank him very much for that. With respect to accountability, the member pointed out correctly that the Auditor General is the ultimate holder to accountability of the government, and that office is being ignored. I predict that the Liberal government would ignore what this commissioner would say.”
“Mr. Speaker, indeed, we already have an agent that is responsible for that. That agent is called the Auditor General. The unfortunate part is that the Liberals have not been taking the reports from the Office of the Auditor General seriously. That applies to many matters, including when reports comment on their lack of action on indigenous rights and settling treaties. That should have been done a long time ago. It is time for them to do their job.”
“They want to appear to be doing something about whatever is being debated in the Parliament of the day, the issues of the period. If major projects are being held up because of federal bureaucracy getting in the way, then let us set up a Major Projects Office. If housing is unaffordable and new houses are not being built, then we have an office for that too. Now, if indigenous treaty rights are not being respected, then let us set up a commission. However, it is not necessary. The Liberals appear to be doing something, but in fact, the bill before us would do very little to move the needle forward. I have just three words for the Liberals: “Do your job.” They should stop the performative arts, stop preening in front of the cameras, roll up their sleeves and, finally, for once, do the hard stuff.”
“One is a very good one, the Tsawwassen First Nation, and one is not so good, the Cowichan Tribes case. I suppose the latter might also be a good example of what could go wrong, underlining the urgency of moving forward. To get back to the main topic, Bill C-10 , an act respecting the commission for modern treaty implementation, people who were expecting that the bill would actually accelerate the treaty process in British Columbia and throughout Canada will be disappointed. The bill is simply about setting up a new bureaucracy to keep an eye on existing bureaucracies that have failed time and again to get the job done. In my years in this Parliament, I have observed time and again how the Liberals act. Their politics is performative politics.”
“The treaty transferred 724 hectares of land to the Tsawwassen First Nation community, which now holds it in fee simple. It is something they can take to the bank, which is not something they could have done under the Indian Act. The Tsawwassen First Nation community is acting on that. Its people have developed the land so that it is bringing prosperity to their community. They have a couple of very large shopping malls and industrial properties supporting the nearby port, and there is still lots of farmland available. Of the 724 hectares, I believe 500 is still farmland. This is very rich farmland, right in the Fraser River estuary, which supports Canadian food security and sovereignty. We have two examples coming out of British Columbia.”
“None of them have treaties, and they are losing confidence in the treaty process, so I welcome the debate, as people in my home province are concerned. However, it is not all negative. There is good news. In British Columbia, there have been some notable success stories in the ongoing quest to implement modern treaties. I want to talk about the Tsawwassen First Nation settlement of 2009. The Tsawwassen First Nation land, like the Cowichan land, is in metro Vancouver, surrounded by very valuable land. It is close to the port of Vancouver and the B.C. ferry terminal. There is a lot of good farmland there as well. This is one of the five modern treaties that were successfully negotiated during the Harper years, and it is a leading example of what can be done in an urbanized setting.”
“This speech is not about how to resolve the Cowichan lands challenges. I have some ideas, but that is not what we are talking about. Today we are talking about how we go forward with implementing modern-day treaties so we avoid ongoing issues like this and the economic uncertainty that arises. I raise this case only to point out how important and urgent it is that we move forward. (1640) Throughout B.C., there is a lot of work to be done. I am thinking of metro Vancouver and first nations communities in highly urbanized areas, like the Kwantlen First Nation in my home community of Fort Langley, or the Katzie First Nation in the northern part of my community, or the Semiahmoo in neighbouring White Rock.”
“We have heard of some big real estate deals collapsing on account of banks feeling nervous. The provincial government steps forward and says it will guarantee those loans, but that is not the solution. The solution is to deal properly and effectively with the first nations people and enter into treaties. The land at the centre of this dispute is not in some remote area of British Columbia where the land is still owned by the Crown. No, it is right in the heart of metro Vancouver. There are commercial properties there, shopping malls, residential neighbourhoods and even a jet fuel tank station supplying nearby Vancouver International Airport. Quite frankly, Vancouver cannot operate without these lands staying pretty much exactly the way they are, so we have a very big problem. What is the solution?”
“What do we get? We get community unrest, economic uncertainty and confusion. What did the judge say in that case? She said that aboriginal title is superior to fee simple title, which is a basic form of land ownership that everyone understands and that forms the very basis of our modern capitalist system. Our economy, banking system, financial security, home ownership and retirement planning are all based on the concept of fee simple. Now people and businesses in the Richmond area, where these lands are, as well as right across the whole province, are worried that their fee simple title is not as secure as they thought it was. What is important too is that banks and financial institutions are also starting to doubt the indefeasibility of fee simple title.”
“In 1871, British Columbia became part of the Canadian Confederation, and at that time, the federal government took over some of the responsibility for treaty negotiations under section 91 of the British North America Act, but it too dropped the ball. This is continuing right now. The Liberals are continuing not to pick up the ball, not to run with it. What are the Liberals doing? They are hiding behind this proposed legislation. They want to appoint a commissioner to take a look at all of this, to see why things have not been happening. This is another unnecessary bill from a government that is lacking creativity. It is becoming a crisis. The recent decision of the British Columbia Supreme Court in the Cowichan Tribes case underlines what happens when the Crown does not follow through with its commitments to respect indigenous rights.”
“Admittedly, this is not a problem of just the last 10 years; it has been brewing since the early days of Confederation. However, I must highlight that under the Conservative government of Stephen Harper, Canada negotiated five modern treaties. Since then, in the last 10 years, there have been zero, which is the problem. The need to expedite treaties, as I said, goes back to the early days of our history, to the 1850s in British Columbia, when the British Crown claimed sovereignty over Vancouver Island and the mainland, what we now call British Columbia. There were some early treaties under Governor James Douglas, the Douglas treaties, over Vancouver Island. After that, subsequent governors and colonial legislatures dropped the ball.”
“Mr. Speaker, today we are talking about an act respecting the commissioner for modern treaty implementation. What would it do? The enactment would provide for the appointment of a commissioner of modern treaty implementation. The commissioner's job would be to conduct reviews and performance audits of the activities of the government related to the implementation of modern treaties, or rather, the government's failure to implement treaties. This is a failure that the Office of the Auditor General, another agency of Parliament, has pointed out in numerous reports. For years, the Auditor General has been shouting from the treetops that the government must take the treaty process seriously, and for 10 years, the Liberals have done nothing. They have dragged their feet.”
“Madam Speaker, we are talking about the creation of a commission for modern treaty implementation, which would replace the very effective work that has been done by the Office of the Auditor General. The Auditor General is responsible for reviewing government operations for accountability, transparency and the effective use of public funds. Does my colleague agree that this new commission would have an inferior mandate, in that it would not have to audit the effective use of public funds?”
“Mr. Speaker, my colleague's speech was very inspiring. One thing I have noticed consistently during my years in the House is that when it comes to managing the economy, the Liberals always attack the symptoms and not the underlying problems. It is like taking an aspirin when surgery is required. The Bank of Canada has said repeatedly that our lagging productivity metrics, when compared to those of our trading nations, are the problem. It is a crisis, and it is undermining Canadians' purchasing power. Could my colleague comment on the importance of the government's doing the hard work of attacking the underlying root problems so Canadians can get their purchasing power back again and not have to rely on handouts from the government?”
“Mr. Speaker, Bill C-19 , the proposed Canada groceries and essentials benefit act, is legislation introduced by the Liberals whereby they would give a handout to Canadian citizens to fill the gap they created in the first place. First, they erode Canadians' wealth by economic mismanagement, and then they give a temporary benefit and boast about their generosity. Perhaps the member could expand on his earlier comment, which is that the introduction of this legislation is really an admission of failure.”
“Mr. Speaker, the Prime Minister is not keeping his promise to young Canadians to help them buy their first home. In fact, according to the Missing Middle report, things are going in the wrong direction. Home ownership among 30-year-olds is at an all-time low. Less than half think they are ever going to own their own home, and housing starts are not even keeping up with population growth. Here is an idea. We are feeling generous. Why does the Prime Minister not adopt our policies to cut bureaucracies so that homes get built and first-time Canadian buyers can buy their first home?”
“Mr. Speaker, I thank the member for asking me a question, and I am going to answer it now. What would I do? We are talking about mandatory minimum sentences and a judge's inclination to conjure up hypothetical fact situations. I was reading section 63 of the proposed act, which would introduce proposed section 718.4 to the Criminal Code. It says that courts may steer around a minimum sentence if the minimum punishment would “amount to cruel and unusual punishment for that offender.” I was optimistic and thinking that “for that offender” would rule out hypotheticals. Is that what that section means, just for clarification?”
“Mr. Speaker, my hon. colleague talked quite a bit about mandatory minimums and addressing the concern that our courts have had, particularly the Supreme Court of Canada, in declaring mandatory minimum penalties to be unconstitutional, contrary to section 12 of the charter. The problem we are facing is that courts have recently come out with the concept of hypothetical fact scenarios. Rather than dealing with the facts in front of them, they conjure up a hypothetical fact scenario and judge the constitutionality of the legislation against that hypothetical fact scenario. If Bill C-16 is an improvement, should it prohibit judges from being able to use hypothetical fact scenarios?”
“Mr. Speaker, this bill addresses, in part, the shocking rise of intimate partner violence in Canada and it introduces the concept of femicide, which is the murder of a woman in the context of an intimate partner violent crime. Effectively, what that would do is classify any murder, whether it was manslaughter or second-degree murder, as first-degree murder if it were done in the context of intimate partner violence. I wonder if our colleague would have any comment on whether that would survive the inevitable charter challenge in the first case before the courts.”
“Mr. Speaker, I am very happy that my colleague raised the Senneville case, which is very problematic. To my reading of that case, the problem is that the Supreme Court of Canada thinks that it can make up hypothetical, imaginary fact situations rather than just dealing with the fact situation that is in front of it. Would it be an improvement to this bill if we were to prohibit that sort of rationalizing by the Supreme Court?”
“Mr. Speaker, I am puzzled about this debate around mandatory minimum sentences. When I read the proposed legislation, it definitely sounded like a back door for judges to be able to determine, with respect to a situation in front of them, that it would amount to cruel and unusual punishment to impose the minimum sentence. That is exactly the argument that judges have been using all along to declare mandatory minimum sentences to be unconstitutional. Therefore, I do not know how we are getting any further ahead, with this legislation, in handling the challenge that the court has thrown at us.”
“Madam Speaker, among other things, this bill introduces the concept of femicide, which is in response to a shocking rise in intimate partner violence in Canada. Effectively, that provision of Bill C-16 would elevate what might otherwise be second-degree murder to first-degree murder if done in the context of intimate partner violence. I think we are signalling that we are going to agree with this, but I wonder if the member could comment on whether it would survive an inevitable Charter of Rights challenge.”
“Madam Speaker, I enjoyed serving with the member for Rivière-du-Nord on the justice committee when I was there in the last Parliament. I am happy the member raised the issue of the Jordan decision. From time to time, there are delays in criminal trials, and the Supreme Court weighed in with a case called Jordan and set minimum timelines. This hits home for me because there was a high-profile murder in the metro Vancouver area a few years ago. The family members lived in my riding. This is exactly what happened, although then the judge made the right decision by very much doing the calculus that this bill now sets out regarding how to measure delays. In the hon. member's opinion, does Bill C-16 adequately answer the challenges that the Jordan decision has introduced into criminal law?”
“Mr. Speaker, about a year ago Alberta Central reported that with the opening of the TMX expansion, bringing more oil to global markets, the selling price of a barrel of Canadian crude went up by $8. This is not just the new barrels but all barrels. This is because, with the pipeline, we had more access to global markets and could bid up our price. Would the member agree that pipelines are good for Canada's economy?”
“Madam Speaker, the member continues to use talking points from the Liberal Party: “We can't control inflation. It's something international. Other countries are doing it. We can't be responsible for what other countries do”. However, the government must be responsible for its own budgetary planning. I have been here for six years now, and I have heard many ministers of finance, one after the other, say that Canada's lagging productivity numbers are the fundamental problem for Canada's economy and the best way to fight inflation is for the economy to improve its productivity. I do not see anything in this budget that is going to do that. Yes, the government is responsible for inflation in this country.”
“The problem with the Liberals, in my opinion, is that they think they have all the answers. They think they are the solution to the problems, whereas the reality is that they are the cause of many of the problems Canadians are suffering from. This is particularly true for seniors, who are at the wrong end of inflation and are seeing their savings being eaten away by inflation that is caused by the government through overspending and deficit budgets. After 10 years of mismanagement by the federal government, inflation is deeply seated. My question is this: Will the Liberals acknowledge that their never-ending deficit spending and money printing is causing inflation that continues to hurt Canadians?”
“This is what she said: “I speak to seniors in my home riding...all the time, and they are proud of what this government is doing, that we have taken action that actually helps seniors in this country to age with dignity.” I do not know whom she has been speaking to; it is probably the wealthy pensioners but certainly not the people who are struggling. She went on to highlight some of the handouts the government has given. I am sure that people are always happy to get some of their tax dollars back, but it misses a point. She said: We are cutting red tape. We are building homes faster. We are providing dental care.... On this side of the House, we have a great record. That is her perspective. It is not the perspective of many seniors who are struggling.”
“There are way too many seniors who have to make a choice about whether to buy food or [pay for] rent”. Laine had this to say: “[Seniors] are also caught up in all the price increases, cost of living and taxes but nobody is being our voice and fighting for our secure and dignified retirement.... When was our last cost of living [increase]?” I am trying to be the voice for Laine and other people like her. These are just a few examples. I know many seniors are wealthy and have nice pensions and comfortable homes with no mortgages, or maybe they have sold a business and are living comfortably, but I am speaking for those who are struggling, and there are many of them. That is why I was so disappointed with the answer I got from the Secretary of State for Seniors .”
“She said, “I worked and planned for my retirement my entire life and now it's taking everything I have to live.” That is the painful part of inflation. It erodes people's purchasing power. Myrna did nothing wrong; she did everything right. She saved up for her retirement. It was going to be enough, but then she was facing inflation, and that is a reality for many people. I could have quoted others, but I had only so much time in my 30-second time spot, so I am going to take the opportunity now to read into the record a comment from Darcy, also from my riding: “I know that you are aware [of] the cost of living and your party knows this; unfortunately [the Liberal Prime Minister] does not.... There are thousands of seniors lining up at food banks and looking for affordable housing....”
“Madam Speaker, a little while ago I asked a question in question period on the topic of the ever-increasing price of groceries. Food inflation is running at about twice the rate of the average rate of inflation in this country, so many people are hurting in a real, tangible and, I might say, painful way. I made the point, in my 30-second question spot, that food inflation is hitting seniors particularly hard. Many seniors are on a fixed income. I would point out that for the people who are fortunate enough to have an indexed pension, the indexing is to the average rate of inflation, not food inflation, so even those people are hurting in very real and tangible ways. In my question, I quoted Myrna, and it bears repeating what she had to say to me in an email.”
“Mr. Speaker, the Liberal “keep it in the ground” caucus is saying that the MOU with Alberta is not a pipeline approval. There is no project, no route, certainly no consensus, and no private sector proponent. Now they are conveniently hiding behind the tanker ban, which is preventing us from getting our resources to market. All the while, American tankers are happily sailing right by, from Alaska down to the lower 48. I have a simple question: Will the Prime Minister lift the tanker ban so we can build a pipeline, or is this just a pipe dream?”
“Mr. Speaker, I have sat through five or six of these Liberal budget speeches over the years and every one of them promises that finally we are going to tackle Canada's productivity challenges. We are doing it again. Here is a headline in today's The Globe and Mail, “Canada is stuck in a 'vicious circle' of low productivity, Bank of Canada says”. Why should Canadians be at all confident that the Liberal government is finally going to tackle this productivity problem when it has been promising it for years and it is still lagging? What is different today?”
“Mr. Speaker, that is a great question. In my speech, I did not have time to get into the housing crisis. I talked about the health crisis, which is a reality, but the housing crisis is definitely a reality as well. A recent report from the CMHC shows that the Prime Minister 's promise of building 500,000 new homes a year is absolutely failing. Not even half of them are being built. Things are heading in the wrong direction. Are modular homes part of the solution? I think they probably are, but they are not the whole solution, of course.”
“Mr. Speaker, my riding is a border riding, or at least it used to be, until the most recent border redistribution. It is very close to the port of Vancouver, so we are deeply concerned about border security not only at land crossings, but also at ocean crossings around the port of Vancouver, which is the biggest port in the country, by the way. Absolutely, we need to improve that. I know that almost no trains coming across the border are inspected, and not enough cargo ships in harbours are being inspected. Things are being smuggled in and out of the country that should not be. That needs to be improved.”
“Mr. Speaker, this is what we have been hearing from Liberal members of Parliament. They are saying our debt-to-GDP ratio is not as bad as the ratios in other countries. If we add in the subnational debt, it is. It does not look nearly as good as they like to say it is. I am going to go back to my points about productivity. Debt is not necessarily bad. It is not necessarily bad for a business if it is used to grow, but what if it cannot service the debt? At what expense is the debt being serviced? Is it at the expense of health care? That is a reality in this country. It is a problem that needs to be tackled.”
“It is the same with a business; the more profitable it is, the more it can manage its debt and grow its business. Debt is not a bad thing; it is the inability to be able to service debt that is the bad thing. When the federal government is spending more on debt servicing than they are on health care transfers, we have a problem. To quote Deborah once again, “That's a lot of potential hospitals burned up in smoke every week.” I have been here for six years, and in all that time, things have not improved despite the government's promising that it was going to improve productivity. The time is now. (1540)”
“Most recently, in the 2025 budget speech just a couple of weeks ago, the current finance minister had this to say about productivity: The government is fully focused “on boosting productivity—doing more with less—because that is the best way to raise [the] standard of living.” I agree with that, and I applaud them for at least recognizing that there is a problem. I want to point out that I am splitting my time with the member for Portneuf—Jacques-Cartier . Why does productivity matter? Nobel Prize-winning economist Paul Krugman said this many years ago, and it is a good quote: “Productivity isn't everything, but, in the long run, it is almost everything.” It is just like for a family; the more take-home pay there is, the better the family is able to service its debt or pay the mortgage.”
“In her 2022 budget speech, this is what the former minister of finance said: Our third pillar for growth is a plan to tackle the Achilles heel of the Canadian economy: productivity and innovation.... However, we are falling behind when it comes to economic productivity. Productivity matters because it is what guarantees the dream of every parent—that our children will be more prosperous than we are. This is a well-known Canadian problem and an insidious one. It is time for Canada to tackle it. The same former minister of finance, a couple of years later in the 2024 budget speech, said: The third part of our plan is growing the economy in a way that is shared by everyone. To drive the kind of growth Canada needs today, we are redoubling our efforts to attract investment, increase productivity and boost innovation.”
“I want to address two things I have heard many times from Liberal members of the House, on the stats they use to brush aside these concerns. First, the Liberals say that Canada's debt-to-GDP ratio is pretty good, perhaps the best in the world, but one thing they forget to do, probably intentionally but maybe inadvertently, is to add subnational debt. The provinces have debt too, and if we add that in, our debt is actually twice as big. The second macro issue that Liberals like to sweep under the carpet is our lagging productivity numbers, which matter because productivity is the best measure of a nation's ability to able to create wealth, which then gets passed on to its citizens. To the credit of previous finance ministers, they have recognized this as a problem.”
“Erika writes this: “In the latest budget, the Liberals want astoundingly high federal expenditures which will leave our economy in shambles.” Joe writes, “The amount of the predicted deficit is completely out of control. Not only is the current generation getting [shortchanged], the next two or three generations are never going to be able to dig themselves out of this horrific hole. You are using tomorrow's money to pay yesterday's bills.” Here is one more, from Deborah: “We now pay more weekly in debt servicing interest payments, than our [government] pays for medical transfers to the provinces.... That's a lot of potential hospitals burned up in smoke every week.” I know that the Liberals will tell these people not to worry about debt, that it does not matter, but Canadians are not fooled that easily.”
“Every time we go to the store, pull out a credit card to purchase something and take a look at what the receipt says, the amount of HST is going to bankers and bondholders instead of to health care, to doctors and nurses. The Liberals on the other side of the House, who think they are helping Canadians by going deeper into debt, will have this to say: “Do not worry, 22 million Canadians are getting a tax cut.” It is a very modest tax cut. I am sure it will be appreciated, but it will be roughly enough money for a family to be able to take the kids to McDonald's once a week. That is not the answer, and people are concerned. (1535) I have a few emails, quotes from people in my riding who are deeply concerned about the financial viability of this country.”
“Another $80 billion is being added to it, and our total debt is going to be $1.35 trillion over the next couple of years. I have a couple of examples to understand these very big numbers. One is to recognize that the servicing debt is $55 billion, which is more than the federal government pays in health transfers. It is also more than we spend on national defence. These are real numbers, and they are having real, negative impacts on our ability to run a profitable economy. To help understand the numbers a bit better, I will say that the amount of money to service the debt, not even to pay it down but just to pay the interest on it, is more than the government collects in HST.”
“I pulled out my little calculator because I was curious to see what the answer was, but there were not enough digit spaces on my calculator, so I got out my pen and paper and wrote it out: Multiply $1 trillion by 1%, then move the decimal place over two points to the left, which is $10 billion. The then finance minister refused to answer, because she knew the answer; it is not hard. I realized at the time that this is real debt, despite what the then finance minister was saying. She was accusing the then member for Carleton of fearmongering, saying not to worry about it, that interest rates are low, money is free, we should borrow everything that we can to invest in Canadians, and that inflation will never happen. That was only three or four years ago. One thing that is absolutely true is that the debt is real debt.”
“I remember one late-night debate in the middle of the pandemic, when we were debating pandemic spending by the government. Our current party leader , who was then the member of Parliament for Carleton and our finance critic, asked the then finance minister a hypothetical question: What if interest rates were to go up 1%? What would that cost in extra interest payments to service the debt? At that time, our debt was projected to be $1 trillion dollars. She refused to answer, so the former member for Carleton kept asking the question, and she kept refusing to answer it.”
“That did not happen at all. The deficits happened for sure, but by 2019 Mr. Trudeau was saying not to worry about the budget and that “the budget will balance itself.” That is when I woke up to realize I could not just sit back complaining anymore. I had to jump into the fray and try to do something about it, so I ran in 2019 under the Conservative banner in the hope that we were going to form government and turn the ship around. Unfortunately the Liberals won again. This time it was a minority government, and the wasteful inflationary spending continued year after year. During the next few years, the Liberals doubled the national debt from $600 billion to $1.2 trillion. Most people have trouble understanding those big numbers. I certainly do; that is a lot of zeroes.”
“Mr. Speaker, I rise today to speak to Bill C-15 , the budget implementation act. On November 4, a couple of weeks ago, the new Minister of Finance , the fourth one since the Liberal Party formed government 10 years ago, presented his first budget, an $80-billion-deficit budget. I have been a member of Parliament for six years now, and I have seen five budgets. All of them have consistently disappointed us. I ran for public office in 2019, largely on account of Liberal budgeting disasters. I remember that in 2015, when Justin Trudeau was the leader of the Liberal Party of Canada, he ran on a promise that there were going to be some small to medium-sized deficits for three years, 2016, 2017 and 2018, but by year four of that mandate, 2019, the economy would have improved, and he was going to present a balanced budget.”
“Mr. Speaker, we hear a lot about the Liberal government's introducing the bill as a workaround for its old bill, Bill C-75 , which introduced the principle of restraint. Therefore, why not just get rid of the principle of restraint as introduced by Bill C-75, rather than doing these awkward workarounds, which are likely not to be as effective as they could be?”
“Mr. Speaker, I think there is probably broad agreement in the House that we need bail reform for serious, repeat violent crime. I am happy that Bill C-14 is taking a step in the right direction, but my question today is about repeat non-violent crime, the property crime that is plaguing our downtown cores. I have some statistics from the Downtown Vancouver Business Improvement Association. For property damage, there have been 143 calls. For theft of autos, there have been 357 calls, and for open drug use, there have been 4,960 calls. People are just coming out and being arrested. Later in the day, they are released. The next day, they are repeating these crimes again. They are not violent, but they are a nuisance and a plague to our cities.”