QP: Stop spreading information!

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With Justin Trudeau back in the House of Commons after his visit to Kyiv, only one other leader was actually present, which is curious in and of itself. Candice Bergen led off, with her script in front of her, and she decried the former Bill C-69, noted that the Alberta Court of Appeal declared it to be unconstitutional, and demanded the government repeal it. Trudeau read a script that noted the Act created stability after the previous government gutted environmental assessments (and simply turning everything to litigation), and stated that they would appeal that decision. Bergen pivoted to gasoline prices and demanded Action, but Trudeau was not done with the Impact Assessment Act. He noted that the same Alberta court found the national carbon price unconstitutional until the Supreme Court of Canada told them it was. Bergen then decried that the Canadians were suffering and that this government was raising taxes every year, and then demanded that the prime minister “stop spreading information.” Trudeau replied that he would indeed keep spreading information, especially about things like climate rebates. Luc Berthold took over in French, and accused the government of misinformation, insisting that the prime minister has not helped people, to which Trudeau repeated the points about climate rebates in provinces that participate. Berthold decried the rising prices in the grocery store—ignoring that the main cause of those rising prices is drought—and Trudeau read that they were helping by means like the Canada Child Benefit, which is indexed to inflation.

Alain Therrien led for the Bloc, and he accused the government of trying to anglicise Quebec by not applying the province’s language Charter. Trudeau read that their bill to modernise the Official Languages Act would protect French in Quebec and elsewhere in Canada. Therrien was not mollified and decried this supposed anglicisation, and Trudeau repeated his same script.

Alexandre Boulerice led for the NDP, and in French, he bemoaned profits in the oil sector and executive compensation, demanding the government do something. Trudeau reminded him that they already raised taxes on the wealthy and were adding taxes on big banks. Rachel Blaney repeated the question in English to demand the companies pay, to which Trudeau read the English version of the same response. 

Round two, and Rachael Thomas insisted that the changes to the Broadcasting Act would have the government take control of a person’s search bar (Rodriguez: I don’t have to say that she’s wrong because she knows she is inventing facts, and that she doesn’t care about Canadian culture), Dan Albas demanded a GST holiday on gasoline (Freeland: Here are means we are taking to help affordability), Warren Steinley demanded the carbon price be scrapped (Freeland: The Canada Child Benefit is indexed to inflation), Marilyn Gladu demanded the government reduce the price of gasoline (Freeland: We will take no lessons), Gérard Deltell decried the price of gasoline and wondered how much higher government revenues are (Freeland: We have a range of budget measures to help Canadians), and John Williamson complained about gas prices (Wilkinson: Petroleum products are priced on the global market and the government doesn’t set them).

Mario Beaulieu demanded that Quebec’s language charter apply to CN Rail (Petitpas Taylor: We have a new version of the Official Languages Act; We know French is in decline so the bill has more teeth), and Claude DeBellefeuille insisted that it be mandatory that French is the language of work (Petitpas Taylor: Read the bill).

Melissa Lantsman insisted that the government drop “vindictive” mask mandates on airplanes because people can go unmasked to a Blue Jays game (Duclos: Vaccination saves lives; Alghabra: We are working on delays at airports), Michael Chong went to bat for the unvaxxed on air travel (Duclos: Vaccination is not punishment, it’s protection), Pierre Paul-Hus demanded the same in French (Duclos: If we didn’t have as high of a rate of vaccination as we do, we couldn’t roll back the measures we have).

Leah Gazan complained that Canada Child Benefits got clawed back if the were on CERB (Gould: We have indexed this benefit to inflation), and Bonita Zarrillo worried about people with disabilities facing inflation—even though most disability benefits are provincial (Qualtrough: We are committed to reintroducing the Canada Disability Benefit legislation).

Round three saw questions on passport delays (Gould: There is an unprecedented demand, and civil servants are working evenings and weekends), temporary foreign workers in Quebec (Lalonde: IRCC prioritises requests from industries like food), interchange fees for small businesses (Ng: We are working on this, and we cut their taxes), labour shortages (Qualtrough: We are taking a whole-of-government approach to tackle this challenge), delays to work permits (Lalonde: We have announced changes to the temporary foreign worker programme in order to meet demands), the minister of the environment not having visited a farm since he was appointed (Bibeau: He did visit a farm with me a month ago and we talked about new technology), grain transport by rail (Alghabra: We have been there to ensure that they have the service they need, and I have been engaged with CN and CP), the government “printing money” (Freeland: You are criticising an imaginary budget and not the real one), Afghan interpreters being tortured and beaten by the Taliban while they wait for approval by Canada (Lalonde: Another two flights are arriving his week, and we will not stop), Bear Witness Day for Indigenous children (Hajdu: We have been fully compliant with Jordan’s Principle, and the negotiations are underway for the final agreement on compensation).

Overall, it was a bit of an odd day, and there were a few outbursts that the Deputy Speaker had to issue a fairly strong warning over, which I trust we’re going to need to see even more examples of in the coming weeks. The Conservatives decided to try and accuse the government of misinformation or disinformation with nearly every question they asked today, which one assumes is an unclever attempt to push back after the prime minister called them out over their own rampant disinformation as they have been building conspiracy theories in plain sight. Of course, this was how Candice Bergen stumbled and demanded the prime minister “stop spreading information,” which he was too happy to take and run with, but the fact that this accusation of misinformation kept cropping up in future questions meant that this was a childish tactic that they are apparently unable to actually deploy in a reasonable manner.

With more questions on gasoline prices and more demands the government do something about them, it would be great if the government could actually intelligently respond to this by pointing out that they don’t set the world price of oil (though Jonathan Wilkinson did make this point at the end of a raft of those questions), or that the Conservatives seem to be calling for wage and price controls, at which point we can resurrect “Zap, you’re frozen!” into the political lexicon. But explaining why the prices are high can help, and this government absolutely refuses to explain anything, and it’s one of their most irritating habits and frankly it’s malpractice on their part.

Sartorial speaking, snaps go out to Tracy Gray for a dark blue jacket and skirt with a white v-necked top, and to Kyle Seeback for a medium blue suit with a light blue shirt and a yellow tie and pocket square. Style citations go out to David Lametti for a blue-grey windowpane jacket with a white shirt and a beige and blue plaid tie, and to Pam Damoff for a garish long-sleeved floral dress. Dishonourable mention goes out to Julie Vignola for a dark yellow jacket with three-quarter sleeve over a black top and slacks.

One thought on “QP: Stop spreading information!”

  1. I think he’s decided that the press gallery has already got their free quota of Pierre Trudeau references. He’s not going to say “Zap You’re Frozen” like he didn’t say “Just Watch Me.” Pretty sure “Fuddle Duddle” (and the ensuing remarks afterward) is the limit. Though, of course, it would be great fun if he had told the marriage-truther trolls from this weekend accusing him of taking Joly on a “date” to a U2 concert, to “quit saying that Trudeau hustles women, or I’ll come down there and kick your a * *.”

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