Dave Epp

“Madam Speaker, like many Canadians, I keep going back to the Prime Minister’s Davos speech. The mark of a good debater is the ability to argue both sides of an issue, and so I wondered, if the Prime Minister was on this side of the House, what would he say about Bill C-39, given those remarks? The Prime Minister’s Davos speech channelled a metaphor made famous by Václav Havel, a Czech statesman, author, poet, playwright and dissident. Havel served as the last president of Czechoslovakia and the first president of the Czech Republic during a time of global upheaval. Havel first rose to prominence as a playwright, using his plays to criticize the Communist system. Havel’s metaphorical greengrocer is an ordinary shopkeeper who places a political sign in his window every morning, not because he believes it, but because he is participating in a ritual, conforming as required by his government, without question and despite his doubts. The Prime Minister told the world that we should not be the greengrocer, that we should take those signs down. I agree with him, and I think he would do well to heed his own advice. I take the Prime Minister at his word that Bill C-39 is a response to real Canadian problems. Conservatives have been saying for a decade that it takes far too long to approve infrastructure: overlapping reviews, paperwork, different departments that ask proponents for the same information in different forms abound. Accelerated timelines, better federal coordination, electronic trade documents and serious attention to ports and trade corridors are all welcome initiatives, and yet the government claims to have held briefings on Bill C-39, but when it holds briefings before providing the text of the bill to parliamentarians or the media, it is not asking for feedback, but asking us all to put a sign in the window. However, Canadians have doubts. My constituents want answers to their environmental concerns. First nations want to know how the government’s plans impact them. I met with union leaders in my community this weekend who are outraged that the government is undermining what they describe as their ability to avoid labour unrest. As a representative, these are not my questions to answer. They are mine to ask, in this place that we created precisely for that purpose. One of my colleagues pointed out earlier that no charter statement has been provided for this bill, as required by section 4.2 of the Department of Justice Act. Maybe the Prime Minister does not want to know if this bill is constitutional, but Canadians want to know, and investors will want to know too. The government claims it wants to create one economy out of 13. It claims it wants to build Canada strong. It preaches unity. By using a narrow majority to ram bill after bill through the House with time limits, dilatory motions that cut off debate and allegations that anyone who asks questions is disloyal to Canada, it is demanding that we all put a sign in the window. When I rose in this chamber in June to speak to Bill C-30, I noted that the government was asking us to legislate first and understand later. Four months later, I am still getting a dozen emails a week or more from community members deeply concerned and troubled by the amendments Bill C-30 made to the Pest Control Products Act, requesting me to figure out how to repeal it. What do I tell them? Should I tell them to just put a sign in their window? I was in committee when the first vote happened after the government received its majority. It is all on tape. I sat there and said, “We’re going to go upstairs, and when we come back down here, the government is going to use its majority to end the conversation in this committee.” That is exactly what it did. This is not a government that is starting conversations. It is a government that is ending conversations. When the government does not reserve real time to hear from experts, parliamentarians and Canadians and really listen to them, when it does not give us the resources, like charter statements, to allay the concerns of our communities on issue after issue, when the Prime Minister rules by fiat from 40,000 feet and when he forgets that the magic of Canada is in our diversity of opinion, when he asks us yet again to vote first and understand later, then he is demanding that we put a sign in the window. The Prime Minister has a choice. He could choose to take the sign down and consider the possibility that everyday Canadians might just have something to contribute to this conversation. This happens through debate in this chamber. It happens through town halls, meaningful consultations, showing up at community events and responding in a genuine way to Canadians who express concerns about the environment, labour implications and the impact this legislation would have on their communities, regardless of our personal views. It happens when we respect the fact that Canadians have different values and a rich variety of opinions. It happens when the government is honest about what it is really doing. It does not happen with special committees and quickie, 250-page bills. Havel’s warning was about the gap between institutional language and institutional reality. The one project, one decision, one year promise of Bill C-39 is a good example of that gap, because the one-year clock does not start when a project first enters the federal process. Once it is running, the clock can be paused for prescribed activities, extended to coordinate with other jurisdictions and suspended further by the cabinet. If the government does not make a decision within the promised year, all the minister has to do is publish the reasons for the delay and provide a new timeline. That one-year clock is remarkably flexible. If the opposition exposes that, asks about it in question period or even remarks on it, we are immediately hit with a predictable ritual of accusations. In this case, it is for not putting the one-year sign up in our window. We need to have honest conversations in this country. We need to close the distance between Canadians’ beliefs in what the government can do, what it says it will do and what it actually does. A regulatory process has integrity only when the people designing it are honest about how it is going to work. Ministers are supposed to be accountable to Parliament. Governments are supposed to be accountable to voters. Bill C-39 is 243 pages long. The Prime Minister says it is the most significant piece of legislation in a generation. If so, it deserves meaningful debate in the House and genuine study at committee so that we in Nanaimo—Ladysmith and across Canada can truly understand what it will do to benefit our communities. We know the difference between getting something done and pretending a process occurred. The Prime Minister told the world that democracy is not performative. I agree. I only wish he had done so here in the House of Commons, in the seat of our democracy, and not at the European Union and with international media. Canada does not need more procedural theatre. We need debate where we can come together, confident that the best ideas have in fact risen to the top in a way everyone can understand. I say to our Prime Minister he should take down the signs, ask Canadians what they think and listen to them. He should give them time to catch up with him and let them be part of the process. Canadians need speed, investment, infrastructure, trade corridors and energy security. They also need leaders who actually mean what they say. In the spring, I cautioned the government. Just because it can do something, it does not mean it should. I find myself reaching for those words again with this bill. The government still has a choice. It can explain itself to Canadians in advance in the House, in committee, in non-performative, non-rushed ways, and in our communities. Having read the words of the people who have written to me, and hearing the concerns of the other parties in this House, I predict that if the government does not do that, it will run the real risk of having to explain itself to the courts or to people on the picket lines.”