François-Philippe Champagne

“Madam Chair, yes I am, with the member for St. Albert—Sturgeon River. I will just go through the list, because I think the finance minister may not be aware of some of the commitments that he made to Canadians that have since fallen through. At Stellantis in Brampton, the plant laid off 3,000 workers. In fact it took those jobs, sent them to the U.S. and promised 5,000 jobs in the U.S. and $13 billion of U.S. investment, despite hundreds of millions of dollars flowing from the taxpayers through the Liberal government to retool Stellantis’s facility in Brampton. Northvolt in Quebec went bankrupt despite up to $3 billion of commitments from the taxpayer through the Liberal government. Ford in Oakville, despite millions of taxpayer dollars spent, cancelled its project and is now making gas-powered trucks. With Umicore for EV batteries in Loyalist Township, Ontario, millions of taxpayer dollars were spent, and the project was delayed indefinitely. GM POSCO in Quebec is an EV battery plant. Phase 2 is now delayed despite well over $126 million from the taxpayer being spent. GM’s CAMI facility is in Oshawa with $244 million from the taxpayer. Their BrightDrop EV project was shelved. Of course, Honda just recently suspended indefinitely a $15-billion electric vehicle project in Ontario, citing issues with global EV demand. The Liberals’ cornerstone, the NextStar Energy facility that was supposed to build and be a world leader in electric car batteries, is no longer making EV batteries. In fact, the auto company involved with that, Stellantis, has pulled out altogether. I will just ask the minister again if he feels his promises are being delivered on an electric vehicle supply chain in Canada?”