For Wednesday, every major leader was present in the Chamber, for the last proto-PMQs of 2020. Erin O’Toole led off, worrying that the wage subsidy padded the books of sixty-eight corporations (per the reporting in the Financial Post). Justin Trudeau said he would get to the question in a moment, and wanted to pay tribute to the doctors and regulators who got the Pfizer vaccine approved, but warned there was still going to be a long winter ahead. O’Toole said that was important, but noted that one of the corporation was a long-term care provider who needed help from the Armed Forces. Trudeau noted that they provided aid when it was necessary. O’Toole stated that the government didn’t do their due diligence — which is something of a self-own given that the opposition didn’t apparently do theirs either, and Trudeau noted that they are being criticised for getting money out too quickly and compliance would be on the back end. O’Toole said that people were being told to pay back CERB based on net income and not gross, and Trudeau said that people who made good-faith mistakes would be given leniency. O’Toole then switched to French to bring up the PornHub story again, and Trudeau reminded him that new rules are coming to ensure internet providers take down illegal materials. Yves-François Blanchet was up for the Bloc, and he once again demanded support for a Bloc bill to extend Quebec’s Bill 101 to federally-regulated sectors, to which Trudeau picked up a script to read about how they are committed to protecting both official languages and an updated Official Languages Act is on the way. Blanchet then wondered if the prime minister would meet the premiers in order to give them all the money they want with no strings attached, to which Trudeau chided him that the Bloc only wants to pick a fight when they have been working well with the provinces. Jagmeet Singh was up next, and in French, returned to the story of shareholders getting dividends while taking the wage subsidy, to which Trudeau stated that they helped Canadians throughout the pandemic. Singh repeated the question in English, worrying especially about artists being forced to pay back aid, for which Trudeau reminded him of the additional aid they provided artists.

It’s quite a self-own to talk about “due diligence” when the opposition obviously didn’t do theirs. #QP

— Dale Smith (@journo_dale) December 9, 2020

Round two, and Candice Bergen demanded to know why Trudeau had not tackled PornHub months ago (Trudeau, with script: We have been working on regulations, and with international partners), Richard Martel demanded unconditional funding for provincial partners (Trudeau: We have been working with the provinces), and Eric Duncan demanded an end to the ban on blood donations for men who have sex with men (Trudeau: We made the commitment to end it and we have been working toward it, but we need to do it based on science, so we have funded them to do it), and Erin O’Toole repeated the demand (Trudeau: The deferral period has been reduced to three months and there are 14 projects tackling this, and while it’s nice to see Conservatives care about the LGBT community, you should talk to your caucus members about supporting the bill to end conversion therapy). Mario Beaulieu demanded support for a Quebec bill on protecting French (Trudeau: We have not seen the bill). Michael Chong demanded the government respect their motion on making a decision on Huawei by next Friday (Trudeau, with script: We will continue to work with our security experts), and demanded a plan to counter Chinese influence operations on Canadian soil (Trudeau: We are pushing back against China’s coercive diplomacy), and Erin O’Toole demanded new sanctions on Chinese officials (Trudeau: We have engaged our allies to speak out against China’s actions and protects our opportunities around the world). Richard Cannings worried about self-employed people facing CERB repayments (Trudeau: We rolled out supports in record time, and people will not be penalised for good-faith errors), and Daniel Blaikie worried about an intellectual property proposal at the WTO (Trudeau: He have not forgotten our obligations to the less developed world, and we will help).

We have reached the point where there is no longer any daylight between Quebec Conservative MPs and the Bloc. #QP

— Dale Smith (@journo_dale) December 9, 2020

Also, demands that the federal government give more money to provinces with no strings attached ignores that premiers like Ford have simply sat on that money and did not spend it. #QP

— Dale Smith (@journo_dale) December 9, 2020

Respecting every partisan motion passed by opposition members is NOT the same as respecting democratic norms.
Cripes. #QP

— Dale Smith (@journo_dale) December 9, 2020

Round three saw questions on regional air routes being cancelled (Trudeau, with script: We are concerned, and are developing a package of assistance for the industry and it will require them to maintain regional routes), rapid tests to get travel moving again (Trudeau: We provided millions of tests, and are running a pilot project on rapid tests at the borders), a demand for more health transfers (Trudeau: We have been there for historic transfers to provinces and procurement), applying Quebec’s Bill 101 to federal workplaces (Trudeau: We are waiting for Quebec’s bill, but your party won’t commit to appointing bilingual judges to the Supreme Court), regional development funding applications (Trudeau: We have promised to be there for Canadians), the proposed Alberta-to-Alaska rail link (Trudeau: When we receive a proposal, we will look at it), a remote First Nation with a COVID outbreak (Trudeau, with script: We have begun evacuating vulnerable members and are providing all assistance we can), and Trudeau finished off with a thanks for the pages and House staff.

Overall, the day became profoundly weird as Conservative MPs from Quebec suddenly morphed into Bloc MPs by demanding things like unconditional transfer payments to the provinces, which is insane – particularly when you get reports out of provinces like Ontario, which showed that the province was sitting on $12 billion in mostly federal funds at the end of the last fiscal quarter, and even looking back at the history of when the health transfer escalator was changed, where healthcare spending was not rising as fast as the escalator, meaning provinces were spending those dollars on other things. I can’t see why the party of “fiscal responsibility” wants to give blank cheques to provinces – it’s kind of insane. Erin O’Toole’s supposition that the government didn’t do their due diligence on the wage subsidy in that it allowed corporations to still pay out dividends is a bit of a self-own, because it’s an admission that they didn’t study the bill to find this problem (which is one of the problems when you allow the government to ram through emergency legislation), but nobody wants to take any responsibility for not doing their jobs, and we keep seeing repeated examples of this in the current parliament. I also find it deeply curious that O’Toole will only ask the PornHub story questions in French and never English (though he leaves it to his unilingual English MPs, most of them women, to ask in later rounds), and we did see O’Toole back for his follow-up questions schtick again today, which is becoming a Wednesday habit. We also saw another example of the same question from different MPs being asked in order for each of them to get a social media clip out of it.

Sartorially speaking, snaps go out to Adam van Koeverden for a navy jacket with a lighter blue shirt and pocket square with a burgundy tie, and to Marilène Gill for a red tartan dress with a black short-sleeved sweater. Style citations go out to Candice Bergen for a black blouse with giant wizard sleeves along with a grey skirt, and to Omar Alghabra for a navy suit with a bright blue shirt and a black and green patterned tie.