| Historical Information |
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| This post is about a previous Session of Parliament. Any legislation here that did not receive Royal Assent has been terminated. |
Happy Wednesday!
Today we’re catching up on the rest of what happened back in December. Life’s decided to be busy lately, so I’m going to skip on a few committee reports, focusing on the ones that have something more interesting from the different parties.
Motions
Confidence Motion – Pierre Poilievre (Conservative Leader, Ontario, Carleton)
Pierre had another confidence motion for us. This time he said that:
- Whereas the Leader of the NDP said he “ripped up” his supply and confidence agreement with the Liberal government
- Whereas the NDP Leader said “the Liberals are too weak, too selfish, and too beholden to corporate interests to fight for people”
- Whereas the NDP Leader said “the Liberal government will always cave to corporate greed, and always step in to make sure the unions have no power”, in response to the Liberal Labour Minister’s referrals to the Canadian Industrial Relations Board that ordered the workers of Teamsters Canada Rail Conference and the ILWU 514 to resume their duties, violating their right to strike
Therefore, the House agrees with the NDP Leader, and the House proclaims it has lost confidence in the Prime Minister and the government.
So I’m going to call this one out for what it is, an attempted “gotcha” moment on the NDP. Pierre’s just trying to make them look bad by forcing them to vote against things they’ve said. Except politicians are constantly taking shots at the government and each other. If a politician accusing a government of being corrupt was grounds for a confidence vote nothing would ever get done. Just because the NDP have declared the Liberals to be in the pocket of Big Business doesn’t mean they want an election. (Though of course now Jagmeet’s saying he’ll push for an election when the House comes back, so we’ll see what happens there.)
This motion was defeated with 152 voting in favour and 180 voting against.
| Party | For | Against | Paired |
|---|---|---|---|
| Liberal | 0 | 151 | 0 |
| Conservative | 118 | 0 | 0 |
| Bloc Quebecois | 32 | 0 | 0 |
| NDP | 0 | 25 | 0 |
| Green | 0 | 2 | 0 |
| Independent | 2 | 2 | 0 |
Cost of Living Relief – Jagmeet Singh (NDP, British Columbia, Burnaby South)
Jagmeet calls out that, given that:
- Canadians are facing an affordability crisis and need more than temporary relief
- The government’s $250 Working Canadians Rebate would exclude many workers and other Canadians who need it the most
- The 2021 Conservative Party platform included a one-time GST holiday
The House call on the government to:
- Permanently remove the GST from essential goods, including home heating, grocery meals, internet and mobile phone bills, diapers, and kids’ clothes
- Expand the rebate to include all adults whose income is under the threshold and did not earn employment income in 2023, so that people like recent graduates trying to enter the workforce, retired seniors, people with disabilities, injured workers, workers on parental leave and long-term sick leave, and others in need are included
- Pay for that measure by putting in place an excess profit tax targeting the largest and most profitable corporations
Two quick things to note here. First is that this was created in response to the GST Holiday that was announced back in December. Second is that calling out the Conservatives for running on a GST holiday is also a gotcha moment. It’s possible for the Conservatives to be opposed to one now based on current events.
This motion failed with 28 voting in favour and 303 voting against.
| Party | For | Against | Paired |
|---|---|---|---|
| Liberal | 1 | 148 | 0 |
| Conservative | 0 | 118 | 0 |
| Bloc Quebecois | 0 | 33 | 0 |
| NDP | 25 | 0 | 0 |
| Green | 2 | 0 | 0 |
| Independent | 0 | 4 | 0 |
It’s worth noting here that the lone Liberal that voted in favour of this was Chad Collins (Liberal, Ontario, Hamilton East—Stoney Creek).
Federal sales tax on new homes – Melissa Lantsman (Conservative, Ontario, Thornhill)
Melissa has a motion on the cost of housing:
Given that, after nine years of this Liberal Prime Minister,
- Monthly rent and mortgage payments have doubled
- The Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development finds that Canada has the most unaffordable housing market in the G7, and the second most unaffordable in the entire OECD
- Habitat for Humanity finds that almost one-third of Canadian millennials would consider relocating to another country to find affordable housing
- The PBO says that chronic homelessness is up by 38% across Canada since 2018 despite Liberal promises to eliminate it by 2030
In order to save Canadian homebuyers up to $50,000 or $2,500 per year in mortgage payments, the House call in the Liberal government to immediately eliminate the federal sales tax on new homes sold under $1 million and call on the provincial premiers to match this proposal.
So some notes here. First, taking a look at what I can find from the OECD we are the highest of the G7 countries in housing prices, though there’s several OECD countries doing worse than us and the US are only just behind us. Report shows a massive jump between 2005 and 2019, and a jump that’s about equal to the US between 2019 and 2022. (The report only really has those three years as benchmarks) I see a lot of people saying that we’re the second most unaffordable but can’t find any data to support that, I might just be looking in the wrong spot. Worth noting that “affordable” is based off the percentage of income spent on mortgages.
The motion failed with 146 voting in favour and 186 voting against.
| Party | For | Against | Paired |
|---|---|---|---|
| Liberal | 0 | 150 | 0 |
| Conservative | 119 | 0 | 0 |
| Bloc Quebecois | 0 | 33 | 0 |
| NDP | 24 | 0 | 0 |
| Green | 2 | 0 | 0 |
| Independent | 1 | 3 | 0 |
Bringing back minimum sentencing for drug-related crimes – Pierre Poilievre (Conservative Leader, Ontario, Carleton)
Pierre proposed another motion, that reads:
- Whereas the government’s experiment with radical liberalization of drugs has contributed to the deaths of 47,000 Canadians and a 200% annual increase of such deaths compared to 2016
- Whereas of 2024, over 80% of accidental opioid deaths involve fentanyl
- Whereas the reduced sentences for drug kingpins and lax borders contributes to these deaths and threatens our trade relationship with our biggest trading partner and greatest ally
- Whereas CSIS has found that “synthetic drugs are increasingly being produced in Canada using precursor chemicals largely sourced from China” and has identified “more than 350 organized crime groups actively involved in the domestic illegal fentanyl market”
The House call on the government to reverse Liberal Bill C-5; to reinstate longer jail sentences for drug kingpins; ban the importation of fentanyl precursor; buy high powered scanners; put more boots on the ground at our ports to stop fentanyl and its ingredients from coming into our country; and stop buying unsafe supply of opioids.
So as usual there’s a few key notes regarding Pierre’s motions, starting with the charged language of it. “Radical liberalization” has not caused an increase in deaths as nothing the Liberals have done have made it more legal for fentanyl to be laced into other drugs. And you’ll note he called out that 80% of overdose deaths involved fentanyl. His claim that lax borders is threatening our trade with the US is questionable as the claims coming from Trump around that are that all the illegal drugs are entering the US from Canada, which isn’t what’s happening. I’m also not entirely sure what he means by “stop buying unsafe supply of opioids” as if he’s talking about the government’s safe supply that isn’t unsafe. Unsafe is when it’s laced with fentanyl. Which the government isn’t buying. (Unless I’m really missing something)
Now for those who don’t know because I haven’t covered it, Bill C-5 was the legislation that largely did away with minimum sentencing. Something the Supreme Court ruled violates our Charter Rights. There isn’t actually a lot in C-5 that deals with drug-related crimes, and most of the drug crimes it does cover only had a minimum sentence of 1 year. Worth noting that those drug crimes still carry a potential life sentence as well, so at least when it comes to preventing drug trafficking/possession I’m not sure repealing C-5 will actually accomplish much.
Pierre’s motion went up for a vote and failed, with 121 voting in favour and 210 voting against.
| Party | For | Against | Paired |
|---|---|---|---|
| Liberal | 0 | 151 | 0 |
| Conservative | 119 | 0 | 0 |
| Bloc Quebecois | 0 | 32 | 0 |
| NDP | 0 | 25 | 0 |
| Green | 0 | 2 | 0 |
| Independent | 2 | 0 | 0 |
Bill Updates
C-380 – An Act to amend the Canadian Environmental Protection Act, 1999 (plastic manufactured items)
C-380 went up for its Second Reading vote and failed, with 118 in favour and 210 opposed.
| Party | For | Against | Paired |
|---|---|---|---|
| Liberal | 0 | 148 | 0 |
| Conservative | 117 | 0 | 0 |
| Bloc Quebecois | 0 | 33 | 0 |
| NDP | 0 | 24 | 0 |
| Green | 0 | 2 | 0 |
| Independent | 1 | 3 | 0 |
Don’t think I need to get into too many details here. In his opening statement on this legislation Corey claimed that the plastic ban is bad for our health and bad for the environment. The other parties obviously didn’t buy any of this and called him out repeatedly for his statements when they voted this one down.
C-380 will not be moving forward.
Closing Fun
And now we’re caught up to the winter break!
So now the House is prorogued for a bit, which means a few things for House business. For starters, any government Bills that haven’t gotten Royal Assent are now dead. They can be brought back when the House returns through unanimous consent or with a vote, so we’ll see what the government decides is important enough to keep working on. Considering the Conservatives have been opposing literally everything the Liberals have done though I doubt anything is going to be given unanimous consent.
Private Members’ Bills, on the other hand, just reset to the start of whatever stage they were in when the House prorogued. So there won’t really be much impact on any of them aside from it now taking longer for them to pass.
As for the posts here, there won’t be any Wednesday updates until the House comes back. I’ll still be working my way through the pile of legislation that came in during the previous Session though, as I still think it’s important to know about leading up to the next election. When the House comes back I’ll be focusing on anything put up during the new Session, but will still dip back to the previous Session if I run out of things to post about.
See you all Friday!
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