QP: Questions about French castles

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While the prime minister was entertaining Caribbean leaders for the CARICOM summit, his deputy was on her way to Washington for other meetings, and only a couple of the other leaders were present in the Chamber for QP. Pierre Poilievre led off in French, and recounted the story of a couple from Ontario who wold their home and bought a castle in France, and wouldn’t be able to afford to move back to Ontario and buy a new home there. François-Philippe Champagne took this up and launched into a demand that the Conservatives support their bill on affordability. Poilievre pivoted and said that they warned the government that the clean fuel regulations would impose higher costs on lower income Canadians and wanted it cancelled, and Steven Guilbeault noted that the Conservatives campaigned on the same standards, but the difference is that the Liberals actually did it. Poilievre switched to English to repeat the story of a couple with the castle in France. Champagne got back up to deploy the “take no lessons” line and exhorted the Conservatives support their bill. Poilievre claimed this was Champagne saying “let them eat cake,” and this time Karina Gould got up to point out that Poilievre won’t explain why he won’t support a bill to increase affordability measures. Poilievre returned to the question on the clean fuel regulations, and this time Guilbeault read a survey of small businesses owners impacted by weather events and pilloried the Conservatives for ignoring climate change. 

Alain Therrien led for the Bloc, and decried that only 20 trucks of humanitarian aid have been allowed into Gaza, and wanted to know if the government has been on the case. Mélanie Joly says that they have been constantly asking to deliver humanitarian aid, and that they are engaging with the different countries in the region. Therrien insisted that Canada needed to show humanitarian leadership, to which Ahmed Hussen red a script about their commitment to getting humanitarian aid to civilians. 

Jagmeet Singh rose for the NDP, and he railed that Toronto hasn’t received the promised $97 million in aid for housing, particularly around asylum seekers. Mark Miller said that they are engaging with the city and the province, and that they have been asking the city for the receipts which they will pay for once they receive them. Singh switched to French to recount a story of someone who was evicted and needed to find a smaller, less adapted home. Champagne exhorted him and all of the opposition to vote for their affordability measure.

Round two, and Jasraj Hallan angrily read some slogans (Bendayan: Your only plan is to cut services people need; Fragiskatos: We cut taxes and you opposed our measures), Tracy Gray cited a survey about repaying debt and blamed federal deficits (Bendayan: Experts at committee refuted those statements and you need to vote for our bill; Champagne: Vote for our bill), and Luc Berthold railed that inflation is higher in Quebec than the national average and tried to blame the Bloc (Guilbeault: Quebec set up a cap and trade system before any other province priced carbon; Champagne: You need to vote for our bill).

Gabriel Ste-Marie wanted a plan to return to balance (Bendayan: Our deficit is the lowest in the G7, and the fall economic update is coming), and worried that new minsters still don’t have their mandate letters (Gould: The mandate letters have not changed for the new ministers), and Alexis Brunelle-Duceppe raised the Auditor General’s report on immigration processing (Miller: are have made progress since the report was compiled and the digital transformation is coming in November).

Kyle Seeback returned to the story of the couple with the castle (Fragiskatos: We have measures to help housing which you would kill; The Harper government’s $300 million in housing built less than 100 units), and Anna Roberts worried about homeless seniors amidst some recited slogans (O’Regan: We have reduced poverty for seniors since 2015, and those benefits are automatically adjusted for inflation).

By video, Lori Idlout railed that the government hasn’t done enough about Indigenous housing (Hajdu: We have been working with Indigenous leaders and have build or restored thousands of units), and Charlie Angus went on a rant about Suncor (Guilbeault: They should be working with us to help deal with climate change).

Round three saw questions on carbon pricing and the clean fuel regulations (MacAulay: Farmers depend on what happens with the climate; Hutchings: Fiona did incredible damage to Atlantic Canada, and here is what we have used the recovery funds on; Guilbeault: Here is a story from someone who lives in a Conservative riding who doesn’t want her climate rebates to go away; Quebec has their own carbon pricing system; Champagne: People in your riding know you’re reasonable so you should convince your caucus to vote for our affordability legislation) the promised public inquiry into abuse in sport (van Koeverden: A lot of work has been done to date, such as a safe sports framework and the ombudsman), the government not “clarifying the record” on the exploration at the Gaza hospital (Joly: What happened devastating, and we are working with allies to determine what happened), not displacing energy production from Qatar (Dabrusin: We are supporting allies with clean energy like hydrogen and nuclear), whistleblower protections for the green energy fund employees (Champagne: We did the responsible thing), failing water infrastructure in Prince Rupert (Bittle: Are monitoring the situation and have available funds available), and demanding a longer repayment period for CEBA loans (May: We offered additional flexibility to pay the loans).

Overall, it was a more sedate day than it was yesterday, but there were still outbursts, because behaviour is not readily changed, especially in this place. I note that the Liberals have started trotting out a new slogan to counter the “not worth the cost” line that the Conservatives now preface every single question with, and that is for Liberal ministers to say that Poilievre “is not worth the risk.” *siiiiiiiiiiiiigh* Come on, guys. Really? This is your response? Trying to out-slogan one another? This is supposed to a place where grown-ups and serious people do serious work, and this is not that.

As for pretences of seriousness, Michael Chong’s demand for a clarification on the record about the Gaza hospital came toward the very end of QP and got an actual reasonable response, but there were also a couple of actual good responses from Lawrence MacAulay (I’m as shocked as you are) and Gudie Hutchings at the start of the third round, where he outlined the costs to farmers of climate change and she listed payments out of an ACOA fund, and they were both serious and factual responses and not just pabulum. I would love to see more of this, please. I will also note that once again, on a day when the Auditor General released a number of reports, a single question about one of them got asked, and it was courtesy of the Bloc. That’s it. I say this every single AG cycle, which is twice a year, that it used to be that this was a centrepiece of QP and the accountability cycle in Parliament for days or weeks upon release, and in the past few years, they’ve been virtually ignored. Again, this place should be for grown-ups and serious people doing serious work, and we are not seeing that.

Sartorially speaking, snaps go out to Anita Anand for a bright blue jacket over a white collared shirt with some interesting ruching and black slacks, and to Ben Carr for a medium blue suit with a crisp white shirt and a bright blue tie. Style citations go out to Sébastien Lemaire for a dusky violet suit over a white shirt and a dark blue tie, and to Patty Hajdu for a dark grey jacket over a black top and wide zebra-patterned culottes.