James Bezan
Selkirk—Interlake—Eastman, Manitoba · Conservative · Canada
“Mr. Speaker, the Liberals themselves are warning that public investment in ag research and development has fallen by 15%. Private sector R and D outsourced to universities is down 77%. The number of firms conducting research in Canada has dropped by 30%.”
“Mr. Speaker, let us separate the fiction and actually have some reality here. Most of our troops are not seeing a bump in their paycheque because the Liberals continue to claw it back at every opportunity. Rents are up by more than 5% for military housing. Housing support is down in more than 10 of the major housing posting locations.”
“Mr. Speaker, everything the Liberals say about our military is just an illusion. They promised our troops raises, but they never materialized. Retention benefits for reserves are missing in action.”
“Mr. Speaker, the Liberal Prime Minister has driven Canada into a full-scale recession. Our economy has been shrinking for three of the last four quarters. We are the only G20 country in an economic downturn. While the government tries to downplay it, families know something is wrong. They feel it every day at the checkout counter.”
“Mr. Speaker, I just want to poke holes in the justice minister's argument over the length of debate on Bill C-16 . We only debated this for two days at second reading, and then we let it go on division so we could get it to the justice committee for study.”
“Madam Speaker, although we are legislators, it is our responsibility as members of Parliament to carry out our fiduciary duties and responsibilities to the taxpayers of Canada and to properly vet all of the legislation and spending of the government. This bill opens up a huge abyss of extra spending.”
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“Mr. Speaker, I agree with my colleague from the NDP with respect to that statement. All too often we have constituents come in who have to jump through all sorts of hoops to get the disability tax credit. The Liberals have allowed the CRA to go out there and make life more difficult, rather than making it easier. Burying people in red tape and bureaucracy and making them jump through endless hoops is not the way to be compassionate as a society. I want to make sure that we are there for those people who need those tax credits. Instead of making it more difficult, let us make it easier. Instead of wasting so much money running up increasing deficits, let us get those deficits under control so that we can put more money into health care.”
“According to research that was done, 10% of our troops are leaving the forces in under 10 years because of the cost of living crisis and the lack of available housing for them.”
“Mr. Speaker, when it comes down to it, we are seeing way too many members of the Canadian Armed Forces in that. We welcome the raise that the Canadian Armed Forces members are getting. They need it, but guess what. The government is not investing in all the other avenues they need. Housing is unaffordable in most of the places where our bases are, such as Halifax, Esquimalt, Toronto and Kingston. Because of that, a lot of these guys are living rough. They are having to live in campers; they are couch surfing, or they are staying in their cars because there is not enough housing out there for them. Actually, there was a story that just broke this week from Western Standard and from Blacklock's Reporter.”
“If this member is so much in favour of supporting the troops, especially at CFB Kingston, why are the Liberals building only 32 new houses this year?”
“Mr. Speaker, we actually have on record from the Library of Parliament that last year, when we take out the creative accounting of the Liberals' expenditures, apples-to-apples actual defence spending was 1.01%. The Liberals have not been making the investments. If this member can sanctimoniously stand here and say to look in the camera, I will look in the camera. I have always been fighting for our Canadian Armed Forces. An hon. member: Tell them why you will not vote for it. James Bezan: Has he looked at the budget? The budget sucks. Mr. Speaker, let us just say this. At CFB Kingston, the housing is terrible and we hear about rat infestations and frozen water pipes; we need to make sure that they are actually putting the money into housing.”
“Are they also retiring the Cyclone helicopters, which are abandoned? There are so many questions about this budget and how it is not making our Canadian Armed Forces stronger and better able to protect Canada.”
“The deputy minister of national defence and the chief of the defence staff said in a release, “We are reviewing these savings to assess what they mean for our organization. Work to implement them will only begin if the Budget has the support of Parliament, so we will share additional information with you once the House of Commons’ debate and vote take place.” They do not even know what the government is doing, what fleets we are going to retire and how we are going to fill any capability gaps that are occurring. Are they parking our old Victoria-class submarines even though we will still be waiting years before we get our next new submarines? Are they going to park the rest of our Leopard tanks, which are in poor condition, and then not have any tanks here in Canada for training or for getting ready in case there is a conflict?”
“They are going to take from this department and from that department and move it over, so there is absolutely no transparency. The reason they can do that is that there has been a new change at NATO, which is that any spending under the Department of National Defence, whether civilian salaries or anything else, can count toward NATO spending. I am just waiting for the government to say that the national child care program is going to national defence or old age security pensions will go to national security. That is how we are going to get to 2%. We know the Liberals cannot be trusted to make the investments we need. In the budget, the Liberals talked about retiring some of our older fleets that are costing too much money to maintain.”
“We know they actually moved some Coast Guard spending over, as well as some Global Affairs Canada spending. I can say that in 2017-18, they moved $47 million from the Coast Guard into national defence. That then increased to $759 million just a couple of years ago. This year, they moved the entire department of the Canadian Coast Guard, which does icebreaking, navigation, search and rescue, ocean mapping and environmental research. Now, all of a sudden, that is all defence spending. They have moved over $2.4 billion into national defence, while adding no new defensive capabilities for the Canadian Armed Forces. We also know that in this budget, the Liberals are transferring aviation services from Transport Canada. We do not even know how much that is yet, but it is still more of the shell game.”
“Only 10% of the dollars that have lapsed have ever gone back to be invested in the defence budget. The rest of the money of course was turned back into general revenue and used on other Liberal pet projects. Therefore for defence, if there is $9 billion there, maybe $4.2 billion is coming from Veterans Affairs, but I can tell you that if they do not spend it, they will claw it back, because that is what the Liberals do with respect to defence. The other way the Liberals are going to try to get the numbers up, and we already know this, is through creative accounting. They are great at creative accounting when they start talking about how they are going to get to 2%. We know that in 2017-18, when they first started doing creative accounting, all veterans' pensions became national defence spending, so there is nothing there in capabilities.”
“We need the minister to come clean as to where these cuts are coming from. The budget is vague, and the dollars just are not there. We also question whether or not the government can actually spend this money. We know that in the Department of National Defence, over the last 10 years of the Liberals, over $10 billion in defence spending has lapsed. Whether it has been Mr. Sajjan, the former minister of defence, or someone else, the Liberals always get up and say that they will make sure any money that is not used in one fiscal year will be repurposed for use in the next year or the year after that. I can tell the House that, in subsequent years, of the dollars available of the $10 billion that lapsed, they have been able to earmark only $110 million.”
“As much as Liberals are saying that it is coming out of medical cannabis programs for veterans, that is only $100 million a year, $400 million over four years. They are still at $4.23 billion. Where is the transparency? What services are our veterans losing? (1600) As we know, the government has failed our veterans at every turn. The Minister of Veterans Affairs did not understand that Memorial Day was on July 1 in Newfoundland and Labrador. She did not understand that every memorial service we have on Remembrance Day across Canada on November 11 needs wreaths. The Liberals wanted MPs to have only two, even though in my riding there are 20 Remembrance Day services. They did not think that was important, because as long as they had enough for their big-city Remembrance Day services, that was fine. This has all been unacceptable.”
“As the budget says, Canada will meet the North Atlantic Treaty Organization's 2% spending target. I am just wondering how the Liberals are going to get there. The budget proposes that they are going to have $81.8 billion over the next five years on a cash basis. That is over $9 billion more than what the Prime Minister promised in June. There is going to be over $30 billion in capital investments. The Liberals have not said what those capital investments are. Where are the Liberals actually finding the money, and is it actually increasing the lethality and capability of the Canadian Armed Forces? We know that one place where they are finding money is that they are cutting veterans' benefits by $4.23 billion in the budget. The government whip can sit there and laugh, but it is actually in the budget.”
“It is money that should be in the hands of Canadians. It is not going towards investing in more doctors and nurses in our health care system. One of the reasons I am opposed to the budget is that it is going to increase our federal debt by over $321.7 billion. That is twice as much as what Justin Trudeau promised he would do, and it means that the budget will borrow $10 million every hour, which will be added to our debt. Our national debt continues to grow, as I said, to $1.35 trillion, costing us $55.6 billion on interest to service that debt. Just to put it in perspective, that is more than the Canada health care transfer to the provinces, which is $54.7 billion. As the shadow minister for national defence, I do have to talk about the money that is in the budget.”
“The Prime Minister promised to help municipalities with housing by cutting down house-building taxes in those municipalities. With the budget, he breaks that promise. The Prime Minister promised that there would be more investment here in Canada, but as we just witnessed when he was in the U.A.E., he is actually taking money out of Canada to invest over there rather than attracting money from the U.A.E. into Canada. Again, that is a broken promise. Investment in the country continues to collapse. What the budget forces Canadians to do is spend more on debt interest servicing than on health care transfers to the provinces. It is more than what the government actually collects in GST. We also have to remember that the big deficits and the great big debt we have, which is now $1.35 trillion, are money borrowed from bankers and bondholders.”
“When they do rise, the government Liberals of course are putting their hands into Canadians' pockets, with more and more taxes. The Prime Minister has broken so many promises since he was sworn in eight months ago. I know that just in the last six months, one promise was that he said he was going to keep the deficit at $16 billion. Guess what. In the budget implementation act, the deficit is $78 billion. The Prime Minister promised to lower the debt-to-GDP ratio. Guess what. He is raising both it and inflation at the same time. He promised to spend less, but the budget is costing $90 billion more. That is $5,400 more per household across the country in inflationary spending, and that means less money in the pockets of Canadians.”
“Mr. Speaker, it is a pleasure to be able to join everyone here in the discussions on the budget and the budget implementation act. It is a budget that I proudly voted against. I voted against it for many reasons. We know that the Prime Minister continues to run up the deficit and the debt in the country. He is using Canada's credit card to finance this very costly and unaffordable budget. The budget continues to drive up the cost of living for Canadians on everything from groceries to housing, new equipment and cars. All of that continues out of control. We know that since October 2024, the cost of groceries, according to the inflation data that is available, has gone up 3.4%. Year after year, month after month, day after day and week after week, there are more and more costs, yet Canadians' paycheques are not rising.”
“Mr. Speaker, the defence minister has said that he would take the lead from the Canadian Armed Forces and experts. Well, military experts could not be more clear: Buy the F-35s. The minister's chief of the defence staff said it, his commander of the Air Force has said it, his deputy minister has said it and now over a dozen retired Air Force generals have said it. By dragging on this unnecessary review, the Liberals are undermining our national security and our reputation with our allies When will the defence minister finally listen to the experts and buy all 88 F-35s that our pilots need in order to defend Canada?”
“Mr. Speaker, the Liberals are running government like a travelling circus. Take the F-35 procurement, for example. Justin Trudeau said that he would never buy the F-35s, but then the Liberals ordered the F-35s later. Now the Prime Minister has started another review. The Minister of National Defence said that the review would be done by the end of last summer, but the Secretary of State for Defence Procurement says there is no rush. Meanwhile, nobody can figure out what the Minister of Industry is actually doing. Once and for all, when will this unnecessary review finally end? Who in the government is actually in charge of buying fighter jets?”
“Stalin and his Soviet thugs failed to Russify Ukraine then, and Vladimir Putin and his Russian barbarians will fail in his Russification of Ukraine today. This week, as we remember the victims of the Holodomor, we stand with those fighting for Ukraine's very survival. May their memories be eternal. Vichnaya pamyat.”
“Mr. Speaker, on the fourth Saturday of every November, Canadians join Ukrainians around the world to remember the Soviet-forced famine and genocide of 1932-33 called the Holodomor. Joseph Stalin's Communist regime deliberately killed millions of people in Ukraine for being Ukrainian. Stalin wanted to exterminate their language, culture, religion and identity. After he eliminated the clergy, political leaders, academics and farmers, he then weaponized food. To grasp the scale of this genocide in Ukraine, we can imagine stripping bare every grocery store, home, farm, fridge and cupboard across western Canada today and then watching every man, woman and child slowly starve to death. That is the horror millions of Ukrainians endured.”
“Part of our sovereign capacity and capability is having a strong defence industry. When we have a defence industry that exports over $7 billion of the $9.6 billion it produces on an annual basis, and 63% of that goes to the United States, we have to protect that to ensure that those industries survive. I will carry on this conversation the next time we rise on Bill C-233 .”
“However, we know by what is being proposed in Bill C-233 that we would have an added layer of bureaucracy that would slow down the sale of parts, weapons, platforms and technology to our allies and partners. One thing that is going to happen with this bill is it would require that no country gets an exemption. Therefore, none of our NATO allies, none of our Five Eyes partners and none of our friends in the Middle East or Ukraine would be able to go to our suppliers and Canadian businesses to buy the parts and weapons systems they need to defend their sovereign territory. We want to make sure that does not interfere with the overall operations of our defence industry and our relationships with our allies. I have to stress that, when we look at this, we have to remember, as Canadians, that our sovereignty is also threatened by this.”
“Mr. Speaker, it is unfortunate that I will not have more time to discuss Bill C-233 , the amendments being proposed by the NDP to the Export and Import Permits Act. The intent is laudable in wanting to make sure that Canadian-made weapons and components are not being used in weapons by our adversaries, like terrorist organizations. Iran was using components in the Shahed drones that were bombing Israel, and they have been sold to Russia and are being used against the great people of Ukraine. We want to make sure that that does not happen and that we hold companies to account when they have sold components and weapons to other suppliers and they have ended up in the hands of our adversaries.”
“Mr. Speaker, I am disappointed with this private member's bill. Essentially, what the member is trying to do is chase the defence industry right out of Canada and into the hands of Donald Trump. Right now, the defence industry employs thousands of people right across this country. She talked about Saudi Arabia and the LAVs that are being built in London, Ontario, a riding that used to be held by an NDP member, Lindsay Mathyssen. Of course, she is no longer here because of the NDP's lack of support for the labour sector. As we know, creating these thousands of jobs and having these companies here actually support Canada's sovereign capabilities to build weapons for ourselves. Those industries are not sustainable with just Canadian orders. Why is she chasing jobs out of Canada and into the arms of Donald Trump?”
“The petitioners are calling on the Government of Canada to call on China to end the Falun Gong persecution and execution, as well as the illegal organ harvesting of Falun Gong practitioners in China, and to hold those people to account through increased sanctions and travel bans, so we can ensure that Falun Gong can practise safely in Canada and around the world.”
“Mr. Speaker, I am proud to present a petition today on behalf of over 260 Canadians who are petitioning the Government of Canada to raise the alarm bells on the continued activity of the Communist Party in China as they go after Falun Gong practitioners, including the grotesque and illegal organ harvesting and arbitrary detention of Falun Gong practitioners in China. As we know, Falun Gong practitioners continue to be surveilled and harassed here in Canada, including the Shen Yun dance squad, which is in North America. Its members perform classical Chinese dance, a beautiful ballet. They have been targeted with bomb threats and intimidation by operatives of the People's Republic of China. As we know, G7 leaders have denounced transnational repression and have denounced the ongoing activity of the Chinese regime in foreign interference.”
“Mr. Speaker, I found the Parliamentary Secretary to the Prime Minister's comments about agriculture to be extremely rich, especially when, during debate today, he has risen a couple of times to talk about China. The tariffs we have right now on canola, which is produced in my riding, and hogs, which are produced in my riding, are directly impacting family members, never mind the greater constituency that I represent in Manitoba. All of those tariffs are because of the actions of the Liberal government. The admonishment that Trudeau gave when he was prime minister to the President of China, Xi Jinping, caused the rift we have right now in Canada-China relations, and the EV tariffs the Liberals put in place are why we have the extra retaliatory tariffs against Canada. The Liberals are to blame for it. Why are they not fixing it?”
“Mr. Speaker, I want to drill down on my colleague's comments on the Canadian Coast Guard. In Bill C-12 , part 4 talks about making the Canadian Coast Guard the responsibility of another minister, but it never defines the minister as being the Minister of National Defence. The member referred to it as an “accounting trick” and talked about how the Canadian Coast Guard does not have any armaments, weapons systems or surveillance equipment to do the job defined under Bill C-12 , which is surveillance and security patrols. In the Oceans Act, which part 4 would amend, there is still a responsibility to the Department of Fisheries and Oceans and to the Minister of Transportation. Does the member believe that having divided authorities will undermine the Coast Guard's ability to work as part of our security apparatus?”
“Mr. Speaker, the minister let 100,000 Canadians slip through his fingers. The Auditor General also reported yesterday that the situation gets worse for our troops after they enlist. She said military housing is in “the kind of conditions you and I wouldn't want to live in” and that we should not expect our troops to live in either. The national defence committee came to the same conclusions in the last Parliament. Nothing has changed, and the report confirmed that the wait-list for military housing is growing to over 7,000. How can the defence minister sleep at night, knowing our troops are living rough, and all he can do is reannounce old Liberal promises for 600 new housing units? Our troops need 7,000, now.”
“Mr. Speaker, the Auditor General concluded that the Canadian Armed Forces did not recruit and train the number of members it needs to meet operational requirements. She further said that our forces will struggle to respond to threats, emergencies and conflicts and to accomplish their missions. The report also revealed that on this trajectory, 13% of occupations are at risk of never being fully slated, and another 69% will not get there for over 10 years. Our adversaries are not waiting for Canada to get our house in order. How does the defence minister expect our Armed Forces to meet our international obligations and protect Canada, without the personnel?”
“Mr. Speaker, there is no doubt in my mind that the Liberals are strictly making this change to the Oceans Act in Bill C-12 to make sure they have the ability to declare that they have now given the security and border control mandate to the Coast Guard, which should be counted toward the 2% and now the 5%. They will not fool anyone at NATO with this trickery, as my colleague said. At the end of the day, according to their own definition, they have to have the ability to provide military tactical capabilities, which the Coast Guard currently does not have.”
“Mr. Speaker, in Bill C-2 , giving the power to employees of Canada Post to seize and search mail without a warrant is a complete violation of our charter rights. Everybody is entitled to jurisprudence, and that was undermined by the Liberals. In Bill C-2, they were also going after the seizure of information through Internet service providers and telecom companies, which we know is also in violation of privacy rights. Finally, under Bill C-2, the Liberals want to limit the use of cash to under $10,000 a year. Undermining our legal tender in this country is ridiculous.”
“We trained and armed them. The former deputy commissioner for operations of the Coast Guard, Chris Henderson, was at the defence committee a few weeks ago. He said that “my strong recommendation is to provide new legislation—the Canadian Coast Guard act—that would enshrine its national security role” and that the Coast Guard “should be given a law enforcement mandate to protect Canada's interests any time and anywhere in our huge expanse of maritime territory.” The Liberals can talk about the 1,000 new border agents, which need to be given control over the entire border, but let us make sure we turn Coast Guard officials and agents into actual peace officers so that they can do the job of protecting Canada.”
“He said that “my strong recommendation is to provide new legislation—the Canadian Coast Guard act—that would enshrine its national security role” and that the Coast Guard “should be given a law enforcement mandate to protect Canada's interests any time and anywhere in our huge expanse of maritime territory.” The Liberals can talk about the 1,000 new border agents, which need to be given control over the entire border, but let us make sure we turn Coast Guard officials and agents into actual peace officers so that they can do the job of protecting Canada. Mr. Speaker, I would remind the member for Winnipeg North, who has spoken the most words in the House but says the least in every intervention he makes, that it was the Conservative government that moved CBSA officers from being civilian agents to being paramilitary.”
“Mr. Speaker, I would remind the member for Winnipeg North, who has spoken the most words in the House but says the least in every intervention he makes, that it was the Conservative government that moved CBSA officers from being civilian agents to being paramilitary. We trained and armed them. The former deputy commissioner for operations of the Coast Guard, Chris Henderson, was at the defence committee a few weeks ago.”
“How is that going to work, and how do they capture all of this, with no paramilitary or border security role or mandate, out of the Oceans Act into Department of National Defence spending? Even though, in part 4 of Bill C-12 , on page 11, they would add 41(1)(f), “security, including security patrols and the collection, analysis and disclosure of information or intelligence”, the bill does not provide anything beyond that. (1710) Conservatives support the move of the Coast Guard, but let us make sure that if the Coast Guard is under the Department of National Defence, we give it the tools, the capabilities and the training so that it can do the job that will be accounted for by the Liberals in their budget.”
“This is under paragraphs 41(1)(a) to 41(1)(e): (a) services for the safe, economical and efficient movement of ships in Canadian waters through the provision of (i) aids to navigation systems and services, (ii) marine communications and traffic management services, (iii) ice breaking and ice management services, and (iv) channel maintenance; (b) the marine component of the federal search and rescue program; (c) response to wrecks and hazardous or dilapidated ships; (d) marine pollution response; and (e) the support of departments, boards and agencies of the Government of Canada through the provision of ships, aircraft and other marine services. We now know that the Coast Guard would have two masters: the Department of Fisheries and Oceans and the Department of National Defence.”
“He gave the powers, under the Public Service Rearrangement and Transfer of Duties Act, that the Coast Guard would be transferred from the Department of Fisheries and Oceans over to the Department of National Defence. That includes the Canadian Coast Guard and the Canadian Coast Guard support services group. As we just heard from the Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister of Public Safety , the Coast Guard would still maintain its responsibilities under the Oceans Act. Under the Oceans Act, “minister” means the minister of fisheries and oceans, and Coast Guard services are included.”
“They might also include parts of other forces such as Ministry of Interior troops, national police forces, coast guards etc. In such cases, expenditure is included only in proportion to the forces that are trained in military tactics, are equipped as a military force, can operate under direct military authority in deployed operations, and can, realistically, be deployed outside national territory in support of a military force. The Canadian Coast Guard is a civilian operation that has none of those capabilities or training at this point in time, and that is why we need to make some changes. Taking aside the creative accounting in trying to find another $20 billion, and the shell game, we look at the order in council that was done by the Prime Minister on September 2.”
“They do not have any of those available at sea. The current Coast Guard budget is about $2.4 billion to date. It has been able to include, in the defence allocation for NATO in the last fiscal year, only $560 million out of that $2.4-billion budget. Again, with a stroke of the pen, the Prime Minister is trying to take money from the Coast Guard and move it under the Department of National Defence without actually meeting the NATO requirement. I will just read what the NATO requirement is. This is out of one of its fact sheets from June 2024, regarding the definition of NATO expenditures that has been in place since the 1950s. It states: A major component of defence expenditure is payments for Armed Forces financed from within the Ministry of Defence budget....”
“However, there is no actual capability to defend themselves if need be. As the bill says, we would give them some security patrol capabilities, or responsibilities without any new capability. That is something we are really concerned about. I want to make sure that Canadians and the House understand that the Canadian Coast Guard to date has no interdiction or enforcement capabilities or mandate. Right now, if the Coast Guard vessel operators encounter somebody fishing illegally, they have to contact the Department of Fisheries and Oceans to bring on one of its enforcement officers to make the arrest and levy the fines. We know that if they encountered somebody in our waters who was smuggling guns or involved in human trafficking, they would have to bring on board RCMP officers to make the arrest.”
“(1705) We would like to see, on every Coast Guard vessel, new sensors and weapon systems, so not only could the personnel do the surveillance that would be asked of them under Bill C-12 , but they could also defend themselves if need be. As my colleague from Cowichan—Malahat—Langford said earlier today, the only things that are currently on Coast Guard vessels that have any fire power are shotguns for personnel use to protect themselves in case they run up against any predators. Thinking about icebreaking ships in the Arctic and polar bears, they have a few shotguns with banger shells in them to scare off the polar bears. They have another rifle that shoots beanbags so that they can throw a rope and tether to another ship or come alongside another ship for those purposes.”
“The estimates that we have to date show we are going to spend somewhere around $44 billion on national defence. In reality, to hit the 2% target, the Liberals are going to have to spend $61 billion. Where is that money coming from? What are they going to spend that money on? We only have five months left, and we know that the Department of National Defence and Public Services and Procurement Canada have always had a hell of a time trying to spend money before the end of the year, and this money cannot just be shovelled out the door. There needs to be a plan on how that is done, and we do not think that is going to happen. That is why we will see some creative accounting through bringing the Coast Guard in under national defence. We are going to get some extra spending but not necessarily any new defence capabilities for Canada.”
“We support the great people at the Canadian Coast Guard for the work they have been doing for a long time. We believe we should expand their national security and defence mandate. We do support the idea of bringing them in under national defence, but we want to make sure it is being done for the right reasons and that the Coast Guard is given the right tools to do the job that we are going to be asking of it. We are concerned that the Liberals are only doing this for creative accounting purposes to try to increase their spending to meet the NATO 2% target, which they have to do in the next five months. Here we are in the middle of October, and we still do not have a plan or a budget from the Liberals on how they are going to get to that level.”
“We are concerned that there are things in here that are not going to do anything to improve immigration, improve public safety or strengthen our borders. There is nothing in the bill on bail reform. There is nothing in the bill to give the Canada Border Services Agency the ability to police the entire border, not just ports of entry. There is an increase in sentencing provisions for those who are either smuggling in guns or trafficking fentanyl, and for other crimes that are being committed by transnational organizations. With the Liberals, house arrest is still allowed for some of the most serious crimes and offences, including for those who have breached the border. I am going to spend the rest of my time talking about the Canadian Coast Guard, which is part 4 of the bill.”
“We should never bring forward bills that erode the civil liberties of law-abiding Canadians, and that is what the Liberals continue to do time and time again. They go after people, like law-abiding firearms owners, rather than going after the gun smugglers and those using guns in illicit crime. They always do the easy thing and make it sound like they are doing something, but at the end of the day, all they are doing is targeting law-abiding Canadians. On Bill C-12 , as Conservatives, we will do our homework. We will continue to look through this bill to make sure that Canadians' rights are protected, that the Liberals are not bringing forward any sneaky new laws trying to breach the rights of Canadians through this bill, especially civil liberties and privacy rights.”
“They have really put a lot of work into Bill C-12 on the immigration side, on public safety issues and on border security. It is through their good work and the amount of exposure we, as Conservatives, have been able to give that we were able to mobilize citizens and civil society on Bill C-2 and look at all the violations of civil liberties being done by the Liberals. That bill was a big power grab that would erode charter rights, including the search and seizure to be done by Canada Post employees and the invasion of privacy rights online, through telecoms and banking changes. They would all violate the civil liberties of Canadians from coast to coast to coast. The Privacy Commissioner himself said that he was never consulted by the Liberals on the drafting of Bill C-2 and had a number of concerns about it.”
“Mr. Speaker, it is always an honour to stand in this place to speak on behalf of the great people of Selkirk—Interlake—Eastman. I also speak as the shadow minister of national defence to reflect the concerns of the defence community, including the brave women and men who serve in uniform. I want to speak about some of the changes taking place because of the Liberals, as well as the lack of interest and investment in the Canadian Armed Forces. I will be splitting my time with the great member for Oxford . I want to give a big shout-out to the member of Parliament for Kamloops—Thompson—Nicola , the shadow minister of public safety; the member of Parliament for Calgary Nose Hill , our shadow minister of immigration; and the member for Saskatoon West , who just spoke.”
“Mr. Speaker, I am proud to present a petition today on behalf of Canadians who are asking the government to ease up on the restrictions under the customs tariff amendment made back in 1992, which restricted imports for personal use to $20, after which duties and taxes have to be paid. Over 200,000 Ukrainians who have come to call Canada home are in refuge because of Russia's illegal invasion of Ukraine. Right now, with the cost of living in Canada, they are asking for more of their personal belongings from Ukraine to be shipped here. The European Union has recognized this and has implemented a 150-euro limit to allow them to bring in more goods from home as needed. The petitioners call upon the government to increase the duty-free limit to $150 to allow them to import more of their personal belongings so they can have them here in Canada.”