Elizabeth May
Saanich—Gulf Islands, British Columbia · Green Party · Canada
“It is easy to roll out solar panels, except that our provincial utilities get in the way. In any case, the cheapest source of electricity, reducing the cost for everyone, would come from focusing on renewable electricity. I do think there is some promise, although it needs a lot of work.”
“We are the only party in the House that does not receive a penny of support from the parliamentary budget, being both unrecognized and unfavoured. I am glad my colleagues from the NDP received funding to make up for what they lost when they ceased to be a recognized party. I have less money, but I am here, and I am not alone.”
“When it became clear that children were dying of Reye syndrome in New Brunswick because of forest aerial spraying by the forest industry. He stated, “I don't like to see people dying. This is one of the things I really wouldn't like to see.”
“That is not the only thing I want to concentrate on, although I will take most of the time, and I am grateful for the chance to speak to this bill now, finally, in this place. Regarding the removal of the excise tax, I have asked before about this in question period.”
“There is not even a link in the language used within the spring economic statement, the budget itself or Bill C-30, but it clearly, by inference, rests on this assumption: More pesticides are going to reduce food prices and help the economy. That is a leap. Let us say that is wrong, based on the evidence, in two ways.”
“Mr. Speaker, the hon. parliamentary secretary is a friend, so when I say a friend, it is not just rhetoric, but I am disappointed. When Bill C-30 was first tabled, I asked the hon.”
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“They launched a court case in 1911, saying, “This is our land.” The chief of the Cowichan, in 1913, travelled to London, England, and met with King Edward VII to say, “This is our land. Can you please repair this injustice that's been done to us?” Well, as we can see, time marches on, and they are still trying to get a resolution to this. The gold rush of 1858 was, again, what triggered Colonel Richard Moody's double-cross. As I said, Sir James Douglas stood them down. I find the history of British Columbia fascinating, but this case is not about any kind of generalized discussion of indigenous land title versus fee simple title. Not at all. Not ever. This is about a very specific injustice to a very specific nation over very specific land that was always theirs. That is what the court said.”
“The Cowichan had a specific commitment from the governor, “This is where you can stay. This is reserve land for you. We're basically taking everything else, but this is reserve land for you”, but then, about 10 years later, along comes Colonel Richard Moody as land commissioner and buys the land for himself as a land speculator. He dishonours the honour of the Crown. As the court described it, he “surreptitiously” purchased the land for himself to make himself rich while violating a commitment of the Crown to the people of the Cowichan nation. Now, time goes on, but the Cowichan people do not forget that this is actually their land. They had a commitment from the Crown, from Sir James Douglas, and the skullduggery of Colonel Richard Moody cannot dishonour the Crown, so the Cowichan never gave up.”
“This particular court decision is about one specific village site on Lulu Island that had been occupied for a very long time. By the way, the court case we are talking about is over 800 pages long, and much of it is about this story: What happened? What was the double-cross? Was there a double-cross? (1615) To go back, Sir James Douglas, in 1853 and again in 1859, assured the Cowichan people that this particular village site on Lulu Island, called Tl’uqtinus, which had been heavily populated and was an important village site, would always be Cowichan lands. They set it aside in reserve. That is what Sir James Douglas did. He was an honourable man. Unfortunately, a little later in our history, along comes Colonel Richard Moody, who was given the job of land commissioner for the province of B.C.”
“They said they wanted to kill Indians and they wanted to get our gold. How the heck he did this, I do not know, but it is a great story. With eight engineers, Sir James Douglas stood them down and said to them, “You're entering British Empire now. Put your guns over there and queue up over here to buy your licence if you want to go pan for gold on the Fraser River.” This is astonishing. Governor James Douglas also negotiated with the indigenous nations, particularly in the region I am honoured to represent here, the Saanich nation. There were a lot of individual nations that entered into negotiated agreements with the Crown through Sir James Douglas. They are called the Douglas treaties, and they are really fair and largely ignored over the generations.”
“What happened here to the honour of the Crown? The first governor of British Columbia, appointed by the Crown, Governor James Douglas, was a very interesting person and a person of real integrity. I will not digress too much about James Douglas, but he was, interestingly enough, Black, and he married an indigenous woman when he came to B.C. His mother was Black and his father was Scottish. He was our first governor of British Columbia, and he set a moral tone that was fascinating. With eight engineers at his side, not armed ones, he stood down a whole bunch of armed folks coming up from the U.S. I know we sometimes think about this now and hope it never happens, but he stood down a whole bunch of armed folks from the U.S. who, in the mid-1800s, were coming up to B.C. in the gold rush. They were armed to the teeth.”
“What the court said was that British Columbia, the British Columbia government, has a duty to negotiate in good faith with the Cowichan, now that the facts are clear, “in a manner consistent with the honour of the Crown.” We use the term “honour of the Crown” quite loosely. There is a minister responsible for Crown-indigenous relations. It is not some anachronism that we still talk about the Crown; it is at the essence of indigenous nations' relationships with the country of Canada. It is something that happened before there was a country of Canada: the Crown, and the Crown's relationship with nations that were here before we got here. In this case, what happened? It is an interesting story, and I hope other colleagues here will realize how specific this was to a specific historical injustice, not a generalized one.”
“The Prime Minister is not, and the Leader of the Opposition is not. I dig into these things because I think it is my job. I will never forget one of my favourite professors at law school. He used to thwack a cane across the desk right in front of us, like something out of The Paper Chase on TV, and he would say, “Develop the habit of thoroughness”, so I have dug in. I have learned more about what this is about, and I want to share it with people because I think it will help take away the notion that in any generalized way the Cowichan decision has anything to say about fee simple property rights in Canada.”
“I take it as my responsibility to dig into what the court said and share with my constituents and reassure them that there is no threat to their fee simple ownership of their place. There is no threat to ownership of land by settler culture British Columbians at all from the Cowichan decision. I want to go back to what it is about and what the court did. This is a declaration of the British Columbia Supreme Court. By the way, I think the Prime Minister was wrong to stand in this place and commit to appealing, and I think the British Columbia premier should be ashamed of his running away from DRIPA and of his decision to demonize this decision as if it puts anything into a state of confusion at all. I am more upset with the premier of B.C., because he is a lawyer, so he should know better.”
“Mr. Speaker, I really do want to thank my hon. colleague from Winnipeg Centre , and I am grateful to her for splitting her time with me. In this day's debate, I do not want to attribute motivations and reasons for why we are doing it or to say which side is right or wrong, but the problem is that it is posing a question as if it is a live issue that needs to be addressed. That is largely due to misunderstandings and misinformation, so let me try to explain, because I am a British Columbia MP. Another British Columbia MP said that the proof of the fact that the court decision has created real problems is that we are getting calls in our constituency office. I can say that, yes, I am getting calls in my constituency office and getting constituents emailing me.”
“Mr. Speaker, I must start with congratulating the new member for University—Rosedale. I have long admired her advocacy for our public health care system when going down to Washington. This may be a bit of a tough question. Does she agree with the Canadian Medical Association that the climate crisis is the single biggest public health threat of the 21st century? Can she help us get it back on track, with her government at the moment going slow?”
“Mr. Speaker, we frequently hear said in this place that the previous government under Stephen Harper was ready to move ahead with northern gateway and that it was the Liberals who struck it down. However, I am certain many people forgot, but I did not forget, that the Conservative platform in 2011 was specifically against exporting bitumen to Asia. Specifically, Stephen Harper's platform said that we should not ship Canadian fossil fuels to refineries in countries that have weaker environmental standards than we did. The Conservatives were explicitly against pipelines across British Columbia to export to Asia. As for northern gateway, it was struck down by the Federal Court of Appeal, and due to actions by the previous government, not the Liberals.”
“The petitioners, therefore, ask the House of Commons to review and update federal motor vehicle safety standards related to headlight brightness. They ask for a report to be commissioned and independent research on the impact on road safety as a result of these high-intensity lights. They also ask to strengthen testing, compliance and enforcement to ensure that headlights do not produce excessive glare under normal operating conditions. The petitioners ask that the federal government work with provinces, territories, road safety experts and vehicle manufacturers to address this safety threat.”
“Mr. Speaker, the issue in the petition I am presenting today was initially raised in one of my town hall meetings some months ago. As some may know, Saanich—Gulf Islands happens to be a riding that has a particularly high percentage of senior residents. The petitioners from Saanich—Gulf Islands are very concerned and raise an issue that I think is Canada-wide, which is that the headlights for automobiles have changed dramatically over the years. The LED lights, with their current intensity in many automobiles, are a hazard, particularly for older drivers, as it is hard for them to see where they are going. This is because of the lack of street lighting and the halogen vehicle headlights, which are extremely bright.”
“Mr. Speaker, almost seven years ago, June 3, 2019, the inquiry into missing and murdered indigenous women, girls and two-spirited plus people was given to the government. Of the 231 individual calls for justice, can the Prime Minister update us as to how many have been fulfilled?”
“Mr. Speaker, I thank my esteemed colleague, the hon. leader of the Bloc Québécois. My question is simple. There is only one product everywhere in Canada that is protected in a strategic reserve: maple syrup, of course. In my opinion, it might be a good idea to have a strategic reserve for our forestry products or for the others we share. I would like to hear the Bloc Québécois's policies on the idea of having strategic reserves for our natural resources here in Canada.”
“The petitioners ask Canadian consular officials to protect Xinka land defenders, and fully implement the report “Voices at Risk: Canada's Guidelines on Supporting Human Rights Defenders” and the principles of UNDRIP.”
“Mr. Speaker, I rise to present a petition on behalf of my constituents who are deeply concerned about abuses of human rights and environmental protections. This petition deals with the activities of a Vancouver-based mining company, Pan American Silver Corp, with respect to a silver mine called the Escobal mine in Guatemala. The Guatemalan courts interceded and instructed the mine to stop operations and adequately consult the Xinka indigenous peoples of the area. After the people said no, the mine has continued operations. The petitioners are affronted. They ask the Government of Canada to take action. We have a vacant seat for the so-called Canadian ombudsperson for responsible enterprise.”
“Mr. Speaker, as we are now debating not Bill C-11 itself but time allocation, I would like to remind my hon. friend the Minister of National Defence and cast his mind back to when the Liberals were the third party in the House and the Harper Conservatives used time allocation over and over again. In those days, those of us back in this corner would say frequently that we did not need time allocation, that we should properly debate and that the routine use of time allocation is anti-democratic. I hold to that view no matter who is holding the reins of power. It is anti-democratic to shut down debate early. This is why I will be voting no to time allocation. I do support pursuing Madam Justice Arbour's recommendations, but I do not like being bulldozed.”
“It is nice to see you in the chair, Mr. Speaker. I am presenting a petition that I cannot say I am happy to present. I was hoping this issue would have been resolved. I know I am not to speak to my own opinion. To summarize, Canadians are outraged that live horses continue to be exported for slaughter for sushi in Japan. The slaughter and the movement of wild horses by air are in cruel and inhumane conditions. These petitioners ask the government to please amend the Health of Animals Regulations to ban the export of live horses and to do so as quickly as possible. I will not quote Jann Arden because it is not parliamentary language.”
“Madam Speaker, alarm bells are ringing of imminent global collapse of key climate systems, but the alarms are being drowned out by the cheering of Liberals and Conservatives for new and more climate-killing projects. Key experts say that there is a fifty-fifty chance of the collapse of the massive and complex Atlantic Ocean current system with devastating and catastrophic results. When will the government stop shutting off the alarms and try to act before we pass the tipping points?”
“Madam Speaker, I want to specifically drill into what we can expect in an omnibus budget bill in relation to the Pest Control Products Act. The parliamentary secretary referenced that earlier. Will that section of the bill be carved out so that potential health threats through reducing the regulatory process of registering new pesticides, which I am assuming this may be about, will go to the health committee and not just the finance committee?”
“parliamentary secretary just described, it does not speak at all, I am sad to say, to the issue I raised at the end of February: the opportunity that is here right now to get non-profit housing built really fast by picking up on the opportunities of ready-to-roll projects that may fall through the cracks before the federal government gets around to trying to rescue them.”
“Madam Speaker, I am so sorry. That was my first interaction with the newly elected member for Ajax. I congratulate her on her appointment as the parliamentary secretary. My question in question period, and again tonight, was very specific. There is an opportunity that may disappear, specific to British Columbia and specific to projects that are ready to go. It is an opportunity for the federal government to pick up on a bespoke program, limited in time and designed to capture those projects in B.C. that are ready to roll but may fall through the cracks. While I support the national vision that the hon.”
“The Prince George council member Cori Ramsay, who is the president of the Union of BC Municipalities, is saying the same thing. So many of these wonderful projects are going to fall through the cracks. We are ready to go. We are looking for the federal government to commit to creating a special funding program, designed for B.C. in this moment and designed to capture those projects that are ready to roll, shovel-ready, but that may fall through the cracks and never get built unless the Minister of Housing , who is a British Columbian, can step up and design a project that gets the money flowing to build these homes for British Columbians.”
“They have hired the architects. They have cleared the studies. They have done the zoning. They are ready to roll, and suddenly, the B.C. government's decision to pull out of the funding has left thousands of potential homes for British Columbians in peril. There are big question marks now over many projects. My plea to the government in pursuing this question tonight in Adjournment Proceedings is this: Set some clear requirements. Parties have the land. They are ready to roll. They have done their zoning. They have their permits. The plans are ready. It is just a question of a top-up from the federal government, specifically designed for non-profit housing in British Columbia. As I mentioned before in my question when I asked it in February, there are projects on Galiano Island and Mayne Island, and also in Saanich.”
“The last statistic I can find since I asked the question, after the B.C. community housing fund was cancelled, is that the commitment from the federal government, out of the funds approved through Bill C-15 , the budget implementation act's commitment of $15 billion to the Build Canada Homes agency, was that $170 million was to go to B.C. This is the latest statistic I can find of what is committed from the federal government to the B.C. government. To be clear, that is the total, which includes all kinds of housing: market housing, social housing, co-op housing and so on. The opportunity here for the federal government is huge. There are hundreds of thousands of dollars that municipalities, local communities and non-profit associations have already spent in getting ready to build great housing. They have bought the land.”
“Madam Speaker, I am rising today to pursue a question I asked in question period on February 27. It was right after the British Columbia government came out with its budget. I have to say that I think every British Columbia member of Parliament was shocked. The B.C. NDP government cancelled a very important program: the community housing fund. The reason I raise this in the context of our federal Parliament is that obviously the Canadian government is making many commitments to build many Canadian homes. Housing starts are up. This is discussed, of course, in the spring economic update. My concern, though, which was not properly addressed in question period, is that, yes, the federal government is providing funding to the B.C. government, but we have a real opportunity here that I hope the federal Minister of Housing will seize.”
“Madam Speaker, I thank my dear colleague, the member for Bourassa . I am also proud to give my support to his important private member's bill. My question is, does the member have the government's support for this bill to be accepted and become law in Canada?”
“Mr. Speaker, I rise because of the member for Kings—Hants's response to a question from the member for Repentigny . I would like the member for Kings—Hants to reflect on whether it was appropriate to, basically, attack the member for Repentigny for continually raising the climate crisis, which is galloping now to a point where we are facing the risk of tipping points and a fifty-fifty risk of the collapse of the entire circulatory system, which includes the Gulf Stream, with devastating impacts for Nova Scotia.”
“Mr. Speaker, I like to share information, and I appreciate that my colleague has noted that I do the work before I speak. I would have loved to have discussed what we knew about the sovereign wealth fund and how it is going to be set up, but all we know is that the Liberals are creating yet another office to consider and consult. If we had information, my speech could have focused on that information.”
“Mr. Speaker, the economic update document includes the following sentence: “Introducing Canada's own sovereign wealth fund—the new Canada Strong Fund”. That is all. There is no explanation, no rationale. There is not a single reason why we should have confidence in the idea of a Canada Strong fund.”
“Mr. Speaker, I absolutely agree. As my hon. colleague from the Bloc Québécois mentioned earlier in debate, this looks a lot like the Infrastructure Bank. Government money is put into it. It is supposed to be a bank. It is supposed to sound great. At this point, particularly since we have no details, we are debating something that is amorphous. We know what happened with the Infrastructure Bank, and it does look much the same, as my friend from Yellowhead has said.”
“Obviously there is no climate screen on where our money goes. There is not even a question of whether it is in the interest of Canada.”
“Our act for where our pension plan dollars go does not mention the good of Canada, and most of the money that has been invested has gone to the United States, not Canada. It has gone outside of Canada to other investments. (1325) One of them stuns me, and I think it should shake us to our core when we look at what just happened in Tumbler Ridge. The Canada Pension Plan Investment Board decided it was a good investment, with good return on investment, to invest in OpenAI and Grok, the developers of deepfake AI. By the way, a member of that investment board is now our ambassador to the United States, Mark Wiseman. Two hundred million dollars of our pension plan money went into that because the board thought it was going to make money. There is no ethical screen on where our money goes.”
“He is still active in public life, and he created the Canada Pension Plan Investment Board Act with the idea of an independent Canada Pension Plan Investment Board to decide how to take Canada's pension money and make it work for us. The investment board is not necessarily even made up of Canadians, unfortunately and tragically. I urge all my colleagues to think about this. Let us open up the Canada Pension Plan Investment Board Act, because it requires that the Canada Pension Plan Investment Board consider only one criterion when investing our pension plan dollars, which is a return on investment. If we look at the Quebec investment board process, in Quebec they are required to consider, and it does not sound like a big threshold, the well-being of Quebec in the interest of the Quebec. This is missing for the federal monies.”
“Let me look at another aspect of the very thoughtful motion from the opposition. I do want to thank them. Under their sixth point, the Conservatives are pointing out something that I have been railing about in this place for some time. There is over $1 trillion in pension fund money in Canada. If we are looking for sovereign wealth, there is over $1 trillion in pension fund money that has been invested outside of Canada. How does that happen? Let us just roll back a little on that. The Canada Pension Plan Investment Board Act was carried through Parliament by our former prime minister, and I think we all respect him enormously, the Right Hon. Jean Chrétien.”
“colleague here is laughing, and I am sure they are not laughing at me, but with me. The point of what I am saying here is that, in Canada at this point, we have missed the boat on deciding to create a sovereign wealth fund based on resource revenue, unless the government puts in place what many of us, the NDP and the Greens, have been calling for for some time, which is a tax on the excess profits that big oil is experiencing, particularly as prices go through the roof due to war and not due to their careful management as managers of the resource. The prices skyrocketed when Netanyahu and Trump began bombing Iran. As the spring economic statement pointed out, this drives up the price of oil and increases profits for the private sector. We should be applying an excess profits tax on those who are basically war profiteering in the sector.”
“I do not see any suggestion here that anyone other than Canadians could invest. Would anyone invest? We do not know what it is. It is definitely a pig in a poke, but on top of that, we are told to wait while a transition office, for which we are paying a couple million dollars a year, decides to consult to figure out what it is. I think we should start with what we know works, which is to tax oil wealth and separate that. The Province of Alberta did set it up and did run it. That was in its jurisdiction. The only way the federal government can do it at this point, and I am not proposing this on the floor of the House, but let us be clear that we could do it, is if we were to nationalize that sector and said that we would set aside that wealth for future generations. That is not going to happen. I know my hon.”
“I take the points from my hon. colleague from Lakeland , who was just speaking and pointing out the differences between Norway and Canada, and they are taken as read. (1320) Let us look at what Norway established based on what Peter Lougheed put forward. Number one is that it was run by an independent board. No government could touch the principal, and withdrawals were kept by law, so no subsequent politician could do what actually happened in Alberta when Ralph Klein became the premier and took over from Peter Lougheed. I will not editorialize on the differences between Ralph Klein and Peter Lougheed, but I think everybody knows. Norway's sovereign wealth fund was created as a sovereign wealth fund. What we have in Canada may be a sovereign wealth fund, but we are starting out with borrowing $25 billion to get it started.”
“Norway created the sovereign wealth fund based on the principles established by the late and, I think we would all would agree, great Canadian Peter Lougheed, who in establishing the oil sands and investing in them, said we have to look at this resource and have some rules. One of Peter Lougheed's first rules was to think like an owner. Another thing he decided was that we do not want to live off the oil rents. We do not want the revenues from oil wealth to go into spending by government. He wanted to set it aside as what we might call a rainy day fund. Alberta created what was then called the Alberta heritage savings trust, and it was funded largely by resource revenue, which went into the fund and accumulated. It accumulated the wealth. Norway followed that example. These are the attributes of Norway's fund.”
“They cannot say they are going to borrow $25 billion to create a sovereign wealth fund, which is going to have all these great attributes, but first they have to create a transition office. It did not need to be like this. We have really good models from Canada for how a sovereign wealth fund can be created. I will take us back in a time machine to a place where good ideas emerged. In 1976 Alberta, Peter Lougheed created a sovereign wealth fund for the province of Alberta. Norway actually sent experts from Norway to Alberta to learn from Alberta about how it was creating a sovereign wealth fund. Norway's sovereign wealth fund is now worth over $2 trillion U.S.”
“When we get to the details, and this is what I find astonishing, because this seems to happen a lot, on page 56 of the spring economic update, what we are told is that yes, and it is very exciting, we were going to have a “broadly accessible [fund for] Canadians from coast to coast to coast” that was “easy and simple to purchase, hold, and transact”. It was to be the Canada Strong fund, our sovereign wealth fund, but how were we going to find out about it? The update says, “The government will establish a dedicated Canada Strong Fund Transition Office.” It will, once set up, “lead a targeted engagement with market participants and regulators, and rapidly finalise the Fund. Further details will be provided in the coming months.” I am just quoting from the statement. I do not want to be unfair with them, but it is absurd.”
“[ Translation ] A big announcement was made on April 27, the day before “Canada Strong for All: Spring Economic Update 2026” was tabled. The Prime Minister announced that we would soon have all the information regarding a new sovereign wealth fund, the Canada Strong fund. [ English ] We were given the big announcement on April 27. There was a press conference. I do not think I got it wrong when the government announced this and that we would get all the details on April 28, the next day. [ Translation ] We would know the details of how this sovereign wealth fund would work and how Canadians could participate in it as individuals. [ English ] We were told the fund would create opportunities for Canadians to make investments and to participate in our sovereign wealth fund. We just had to wait a day for the details.”
“Mr. Speaker, I want to thank my dear colleague from Mount Royal, the parliamentary secretary, for sharing his time with me. I hope he will not regret it after hearing my speech because there are several things in the opposition motion that I agree with. This might be the first time I find myself in this situation. [ English ] I usually do not find myself agreeing so very much with opposition day motions from the official opposition. I am watchful, and I really am very careful, of how long it takes to study, be fair and consider what has been put before us. I will try to make a number of points that relate to the multiple paragraphs in the opposition day motion. I will start with one of the government's announcements and my experience as a parliamentarian and as a Canadian citizen.”
“Mr. Speaker, it is an honour to present a petition on behalf of concerned residents of Saanich—Gulf Islands and others. The petitioners note that what we have learned from the empirical evidence is that for people who suffer from mental health issues and substance abuse, incarcerating them is not effective in alleviating the burden to society, the individual or their family. Therefore, the petitioners call upon the government to cease incarceration of people who suffer from drug abuse and to rehabilitate them back into society through treatment programs, as is done in Portugal.”
“Mr. Speaker, I totally agree with my hon. colleague from Edmonton Strathcona that this is also worrying. It appears that the government thinks there is enough of a surplus in the Canada pension plan that it is okay to reduce contributions. We need to know that there is not going to be a reduction in the benefits to which senior Canadians are entitled, and we need to know that it is not seen as a business tax. Also, there is one quick thing, if I may. The Canada Pension Plan Investment Board Act is one of the pieces of legislation that should be amended. There is $80 billion in the Canada Pension Plan Investment Board. It has access to $80 billion, and most of it is invested in the United States. All it looks at is the return on investment, not thinking of Canada first in regard to where we invest our Canada pension plan dollars.”
“However, to decide, as though we are still living in the 1950s, that our future lies in fossil fuels, and that economic growth and growing the GDP is enough to make Canada a more prosperous country with greater societal well-being, is simply wrong. It does not lead us there. History has taught us that. What makes Canada's economy strong is economic sovereignty. What gives us resilience is to not be dependent on the United States to the degree we are, but to broaden our links and link arms with democracies that respect human rights and climate action. That is not too late to achieve.”
“Here we have the government's vision, “Artificial Intelligence for All”. That is just plain tone-deaf. We need legislation that regulates online harms from this development. We are not going to be able to stop AI, but the idea that we are going to have a homegrown AI industry that creates lots of jobs for Canadians is hooey. However, it is a big part, apparently, of the vision of the government for the future of Canada's economy. I will close by saying this. There are opportunities for Canada, even in this world of geopolitical instability. There are opportunities for us to stand up for human rights, to stand up for other democracies, to only trade with other democracies that respect human rights and to be a beacon of hope and sanity in this world.”
“I kept pressing on how that would increase federal revenues, as the spring economic update claims at page 64. Finally, it was admitted that it was not exactly that it increases the revenue, but decreases the spending, as the federal government no longer has to provide as much money to the oil industry for the purpose of keeping carbon in the ground. It just creates more profits for the oil industry and somewhat reduces the spending of the federal government. It is not new revenue. There is so much here that I found difficult to absorb and hard to accept, particularly the government's vision on artificial intelligence. I have to say, from yesterday's protests of young people on the lawns of Parliament, that they are concerned about the impacts of artificial intelligence and screen time on their mental health and well-being.”
“(1850) Astonishingly, at page 64, it says that this will, “increase federal revenues by $395 million over four years”. I had to press. I asked how increasing a subsidy to the oil and gas industry would increase federal revenue. The government had to admit that It might be considered misleading because it does not actually increase government revenue. What it does is decrease some government spending as against the system of November 2025, the carbon capture, utilization and storage piece. The Government of Canada was supporting keeping carbon in the ground, which meant it was paying to help the oil and gas industry store carbon. When it does not store as much, because with enhanced oil recovery it takes it out of the ground, it increases the profits of the oil industry by allowing that oil to come out of the ground and be sold and burned.”