Happy Wednesday! Shorter summary today as the House is off this week, but we’ve got two Motions on the Carbon Tax and a few Bill updates.
Committee Reports
Committee on Science and Research (SRSR) – Revitalizing Research and Scientific Publication in French in Canada
The SRSR has been working on a study on how to improve research and scientific publications in French in Canada and has come back with the following recommendations:
- Continue funding for the Service to Assist Research in French project to support francophone scientists in Canada.
- Provide permanent funding for research involving Canadian francophone communities.
- Earmark funds so the research community can draw upon official languages data from the 2021 Census and future data from the Survey on the Official Language Minority Population.
- Work with provinces to build a program for sustainable funding for post-secondary institutions in official language minority communities. This program should consider challenges faced by the institutions, such as small class sizes, distances, and any other additional costs.
- Work with provinces to develop and fund a Canada-wide strategy for supporting research and publication in French
- Establish a French-language science office, attached to the Office of the Chief Science Advisor. This office will monitor research and publications in French and coordinate support for them.
- Have granting agencies (the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council, Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council of Canada, and the Canadian Institutes of Health Research) review the criteria for allocating funding. The aim here is to better balance the requirements for funding to more accurately recognize research conducted in French.
- Have the granting agencies re-evaluate the language proficiency of the experts in their review committees.
- Have a quota of the funding given by granting agencies be used as a minimum level of funding for research conducted in French.
- Have the granting agencies take steps to encourage funding applications in French.
- Have the granting agencies monitor the proportion of funding applications submitted in French and make sure the success rate of these applications is fair.
- Increase funding for French and bilingual scholarly journals.
- Have the Chief Science Advisor of Canada set up a special committee to find actions that can be taken to increase scientific publications in French.
- Invest in translation services in both official languages for use by researchers.
- Provide stable, predictable funding to services that offer open access to French-language scientific research.
- Have the granting agencies develop support programs for French-language science outreach and communication.
- Develop an international student exchange program for post-secondary schools for French-speaking countries.
So quite a bit here but the basics are the SRSR suggest that the government provide more money and support programs.
This report was accepted with everyone voting in support of the recommendations.
Motions
Carbon Tax Increase – Andrew Scheer (Conservative, Saskatchewan, Regina—Qu’Appelle)
We have another Motion from this Conservatives regarding the Carbon Tax. This one reads:
Given that 70% of the provinces and 70% of Canadians oppose the Prime Minister’s 23% carbon tax hike on April 1, the House call on the NDP-Liberal coalition to immediately cancel this hike.
Not much to say on this one, it’s pretty straightforward. Only note is that the NDP and Liberals don’t have a coalition and the Bloc Québécois have also been extremely supportive of the Carbon Tax.
The Motion failed with 119 votes in favour and 205 votes against.
| Party | For | Against | Paired |
|---|---|---|---|
| Liberal | 0 | 149 | 1 |
| Conservative | 117 | 0 | 0 |
| Bloc Quebecois | 0 | 31 | 1 |
| NDP | 0 | 22 | 0 |
| Green | 0 | 2 | 0 |
| Independent | 2 | 1 | 0 |
Carbon Tax Election – Pierre Poilievre (Conservative Leader, Ontario, Carleton)
Pierre also has a Carbon Tax Motion, this one calling for the House to declare non-confidence and force an election over the Carbon Tax.
That the House declare non-confidence in the Prime Minister and his costly government for increasing the carbon tax 23% on April 1, as part of his plan to quadruple the tax while Canadians cannot afford to eat, heat, and house themselves, and call for the House to be dissolved so Canadians can vote in a carbon tax election.
This Motion failed with 116 voting in favour and 204 voting against.
| Party | For | Against | Paired |
|---|---|---|---|
| Liberal | 0 | 150 | 4 |
| Conservative | 115 | 0 | 2 |
| Bloc Quebecois | 0 | 28 | 2 |
| NDP | 0 | 23 | 0 |
| Green | 0 | 2 | 0 |
| Independent | 1 | 1 | 0 |
Bill Updates
C-365 – Consumer-led Banking Act
C-365 went up for its Second Reading vote and passed with 172 votes in favour and 150 votes against.
| Party | For | Against | Paired |
|---|---|---|---|
| Liberal | 1 | 149 | 1 |
| Conservative | 116 | 0 | 0 |
| Bloc Quebecois | 29 | 0 | 1 |
| NDP | 22 | 0 | 0 |
| Green | 2 | 0 | 0 |
| Independent | 2 | 1 | 0 |
Worth noting here that Nathaniel Erskine-Smith (Liberal, Ontario, Beaches—East York) is the one Liberal MP that voted in favour of C-365.
It looks like the Liberals are against C-365 because it doesn’t have a lot of details on what the framework would look like and they’re already working on putting together their own framework.
The Bloc Québécois call out that we need to get a framework set up quickly. New companies are popping up requesting access to our financial information and don’t fall under existing regulations. This could lead to risks, such as who is responsible for a leak of your information if the company that caused the leak no longer exists. They also call out that we also have co-operative financial institutions, which aren’t banks and don’t fall under federal regulations. Setting up a framework that will help coordinate with provinces will help make sure everyone’s protected.
The NDP support C-365 but think that there’s a lot more that needs fixing when it comes to banking in Canada.
C-365 will now be sent to the Committee on Finance.
C-29 – National Council for Reconciliation Act
When we last saw C-29 the House was still looking at the Senate’s amendments to it. Steven MacKinnon (Liberal, Quebec, Gatineau) wants to pass a Time Allocation Motion to allow for one more day of discussion on the amendments at which point they will go to a vote.
This Motion passed with 178 voting in favour and 146 voting against.
| Party | For | Against | Paired |
|---|---|---|---|
| Liberal | 152 | 0 | 1 |
| Conservative | 0 | 115 | 0 |
| Bloc Quebecois | 0 | 30 | 1 |
| NDP | 24 | 0 | 0 |
| Green | 1 | 1 | 0 |
| Independent | 1 | 0 | 0 |