Linda Lapointe

“Madam Speaker, I would like to take a few moments to talk about a very decent man. Sylvain Bergeron is a tireless advocate for the rights of the unemployed in Saguenay—Lac-Saint-Jean. I can assure the House that he has probably assisted in more EI cases than all the members here combined, and that is saying something. He also advocates on behalf of the most vulnerable. He has been involved in numerous social justice campaigns. He is a source of inspiration for people working in community-based organizations in Saguenay—Lac-Saint-Jean. This is a guy who puts pressure on members like me to effect change. I wanted to recognize him today because he has requested medical assistance in dying, and he is inviting people to visit him today and tomorrow at the Chicoutimi hospital to say goodbye. On behalf of the people of Saguenay—Lac-Saint-Jean, I want to acknowledge his exceptional work and bid him the fondest farewell. Getting back to today’s motion, I will be sharing my time with the hon. member for Montcalm, who is anything but calm. Why are we moving a motion today on levies and funding for culture? Perhaps I will start with a fairly simple answer: It is to defend Quebec’s identity. We know that culture is a strong driver of identity. Why do the government and the opposition seem unsympathetic to our demands? I sense that people do not fully understand what Quebec culture and identity entail. I know that this may bother some federalist friends, but I think there is a clear distinction between the Quebec identity and the Canadian identity. I will give a very simple, mundane example that may seem a little unserious. Then we will get back to serious things. To understand the difference between Quebec identity and Canadian identity, take one of the Liberal Party’s slogans from the last election: “elbows up”. When Quebeckers are told to lift their elbow, they understand “have a drink”. I know many Quebeckers who wondered whether the government was suggesting they take a shot to forget about the tariff crisis during the election campaign. This is anecdotal but true. To illustrate this difference between Quebec identity and Canadian identity, I would like to go back to the early 2000s. When I began my master’s degree at the University of Ottawa, I learned about a major study that had been carried out across Canada. This study was trying to distinguish between Canadian identity and American identity. It was looking at what made Canadians different from Americans. This question was asked in all of the Canadian provinces, and the answers were very interesting. When Canadians were asked what made them different from Americans, the first thing that they said was that they had a public health care system. That was the most common answer. The second most common answer was that Canada is multicultural, not a melting pot. These are two very institutional things. When Quebeckers were asked the same question about what made them different from Americans, the first thing they said was language. The second thing they said was culture. The third thing was our soap operas. I found that quite funny. In the early 2000s, Quebeckers felt that their soaps were part of their identity. Quebec identity is strongly rooted in our language and culture. That makes sense because we are a national minority within Canada and throughout the Americas. We speak French and our cultural products are very different. Why am I saying this? It is because it is clear and it is a fact that even my federalist colleagues should be able to recognize: Quebec culture is fundamentally different from Canadian culture. Why are people today indifferent to calls for levies to support the cultural sector? It is because it does not affect them. The cultural products consumed by English-speaking Canadians are essentially the same as those consumed by Americans. They are perfectly happy with platforms like Netflix and Disney+. They consume the same type of cultural content. It is very different for Quebeckers, and that is where we see this indifference on the part of the federal government. Since it only affects Quebeckers, why bother making an effort? Why risk making Mr. Trump unhappy? Since it only affects Quebeckers, let us just let it slide. That is what we have seen. Earlier, in a question, I referred to the letter from the leader of the official opposition to the Prime Minister, asking him to end the levies so as not to upset Mr. Trump, which the prime minister did. He abolished the levies to avoid upsetting Mr. Trump and, in doing so, demonstrated his indifference toward Quebec culture. While the Conservatives and Liberals fear retaliation from Donald Trump, what we fear, clearly, is the decline of Quebec culture. We are in the midst of a tariff crisis, which is very tough, but I would say that there is a much bigger crisis: the fact that the rise of the web giants weakens our culture and may put it at risk. Perhaps we should address this issue first. I encourage my Quebec MP friends, whether Conservative or Liberal, to honestly ask themselves this: Do we want to further weaken Quebec culture? Instead of making web giants pay, what they are doing today is making all Quebeckers pay. In a way, it contributes to weakening Quebec culture. In that sense, we need to put an end to the spurious argument that I have heard from many colleagues: the affordability argument. People have been saying all day that if we had kept the levy system, the web giants would have passed the bill on to consumers, so it had to go. Instead, the government came up with $600 million. We have to wonder, where does that $600 million come from? It does not appear out of thin air. Where does the government get its money from? It comes out of taxpayers’ pockets. It is a bit spurious to say that the government does not want levies because people will be stuck with the bill, but on the other hand, it says that it is going to take $600 million in taxes and try to redistribute it. That has not yet happened, as everyone has pointed out. I find it pretty spurious. I would like to draw an analogy. When I look at the situation today, I see the federal government treating the web giants the same way that it treats the oil and gas sector. Their goal is to protect the greedy corporate giants. The web giants make roughly $4 billion a year on average, but the federal government does not want to require them to pay levies. In much the same way, it funds infrastructure for the oil industry, which raked in $131 billion in profits between 2020 and 2024. The federal government protects these greedy corporations that are awash in public money. It pays for their infrastructure, but it does not stand up for Canadian and Quebec taxpayers. Instead, it prefers to give those greedy corporations free rein. This analogy is important because it reflects the federal government’s response to the worst crisis that we are currently facing, which is the tariff crisis. The federal government’s response has been to support the only sector that has not been hit with tariffs, the oil sector, by providing $44 billion in infrastructure to the greedy oil companies and give special treatment to the web giants that are raking in billions of dollars in profits while hollowing out our culture. As an elected member from Quebec, I find that shameful.”