Alexis Deschênes

“I think each person should get to decide for themselves what dignity means. Some people want medical assistance in dying because they do not want to reach a point of suffering where they are no longer themselves. Can the member understand that point of view?”

“Mr. Speaker, I thank my colleague for his contribution to this debate. At the beginning of his speech, he said that a person’s dignity is not diminished by their suffering or by their dependence on others. Should that not be a personal choice? Should we not trust each individual to decide where to draw the line in terms of when their dignity is at risk? My colleague’s personal position is entirely valid. However, there are those who think differently and who want to be able to use medical assistance in dying to end their lives when they feel that, by a certain point, they will be experiencing so much suffering that they would no longer be themselves. Can my colleague understand that position?”

“The government must reverse its decision to cut staff at Parks Canada. Ninety-five full-time workers in Forillon and Restigouche could lose their jobs. These parks are vital for tourism. This is especially wrong because 225 families were forced off their land to create Forillon park.”

“Mr. Speaker, staff cuts at Parks Canada are an insult to the history of the Gaspé Peninsula: Ninety-five full-time workers are facing possible layoffs in Forillon and Restigouche. These parks are vital to our tourism industry. The insult is all the more egregious considering that 225 Forillon families were expropriated to create the park, causing wounds that have yet to heal. Imagine, Liberals expropriated these people only for other Liberals to come along and cut jobs and services. Is the government going to reverse this reprehensible decision?”

“We all want to protect children online, and Quebec already did a major study on this. But the federal government wrote this bill without properly consulting the provinces, including Quebec. I want to know what my colleague thinks about the government stepping into provincial jurisdiction.”

“Mr. Speaker, I thank my colleague for her contribution to the debate. I want to hear her thoughts about the issue of federalism, respect for areas of jurisdiction and the co-operation that should normally exist within any self-respecting federation. In terms of protecting children, which is an objective we all share, Quebec has already created a special committee and completed a rigorous study to determine what actions can be taken, particularly with regard to banning social media for children. Still, we notice that the government drafted Bill C‑34 without considering the provinces and without thoroughly and adequately consulting the Government of Quebec. What does my colleague think about the government’s failure to respect provincial jurisdiction in drafting Bill C‑34?”

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“Did the government consult with people before writing this bill? In particular, did it talk to Quebec, which has already done a lot of work on rules for kids using social media?”

“Mr. Speaker, I thank my colleague for his contribution to the debate. My question is as follows: Before drafting Bill C‑34, did the government carry out consultations, particularly with Quebec, which has already made significant progress on the issue of regulating access to social media for minors?”

“I want the House to pass this bill. It makes it illegal to share online porn with kids and lets the government block websites that do not check users' ages. Kids spend hours online every day, and seeing porn can harm them. This bill will not stop everything, but it will make it harder for minors to access it.”

“Mr. Speaker, what purpose do the laws we pass here serve? They serve to civilize society. That is what I have always loved about the law and the body of legislation built over time. Obviously, when new sectors emerge, the law often lags a little behind. The government has to catch up and figure out what is happening. With the development of digital and virtual technology, we have work to do as legislators. Last week, one of the topics we discussed was the digital services tax. A little while ago, we discussed Bill C‑34, which also seeks to regulate the social media sector. Now, we are now discussing Bill S‑209, which is a worthwhile bill. The Bloc Québécois supports it, because what is happening online should be regulated more. More and more people are living their lives online. The online world is increasingly becoming the place where people communicate, interact, meet and learn. It is crazy. I was looking at some statistics earlier. Young people spend more than three hours a day online. The law must adapt. One of the risks children face online is coming across pornographic material, and we know that exposure to such material can have damaging effects on their healthy sexual development. Bill S-209 seeks address that issue. That is why we support it. I want to say from the outset that the Association des pédiatres du Québec also supports this bill and believes that this initiative must be commended. I think that this bill will transcend party lines. Now that information technology makes pornographic content more widely available, the government has a duty to restrict minors’ access to such material as much as possible. Bill S-209 makes it an offence for organizations to make pornographic material available to young persons on the Internet. Furthermore, it enables a designated enforcement authority to take steps to prevent pornographic material from being made available to young persons on the Internet in Canada. This bill is motivated by a desire to better regulate online access to pornographic material through age verification, which is currently limited to a mere declaration. In fact, that is the main purpose of this bill. We should commend Senator Miville-Dechêne for laying the groundwork in Bill S-203, which is moving forward under a new name. The bill does not answer every question, but it sets forth the general principles of verifying the age of customers seeking access to pornographic content. Once enacted, the bill will authorize the relevant authority to make regulations establishing a specific framework to be implemented. The bill also sets out the consequences for pornographic websites that violate the law, whether or not they are hosted in Canada. People may be wondering whether we can still civilize the virtual world when everything is hosted overseas. The answer is yes, we can still take action within our own borders. The bill allows the government to block sites that fail to comply with the future age verification regulations. Is this a silver bullet that will ensure no child ever gains access to pornographic content? Probably not. There will always be ways to circumvent age verification measures, whether through VPNs or other workarounds. Nonetheless, we believe the bill will have beneficial effects because it will make access more difficult and, ultimately, protect children. In our view, supporting Bill S‑209 is common sense. It means standing up for measures designed to protect the public and promote healthy lifestyle choices. This bill addresses a real concern in our communities. That is why we will support this bill and recommend that it pass second reading.”

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“We need rules for social media because it harms young people. Quebec studied this and recommended banning social media for kids 14 and under, but this bill bans it for kids 16 and under. I want to know if the government will respect Quebec's authority over protecting youth and read Quebec's report.”

“Mr. Speaker, the Bloc Québécois definitely believes that social media needs to be regulated. It is a new sector, and we are already seeing serious harms emerge. Most recently, in August, Meta agreed to a settlement and paid $16 billion in compensation for the harm caused to young people. Quebec has already undertaken a collective review with the aim of protecting our young people from screen time, and it has made significant progress in that endeavour. The Select Committee on the Impacts of Screens and Social Media on Young People’s Health and Development tabled a report recommending a ban on social media for children aged 14 and under, rather than 16 and under, as proposed in Bill C-34. My question for my colleague is this: Will the government respect Quebec’s jurisdiction over youth protection? Has the report been consulted and has the question been asked—”

In response to a question from Harb Gill

“I want the House to pass this bill to stop the labour minister from quickly ending strikes. The government has used this power too often lately, including with airlines, railways, and ports. The Supreme Court says the right to strike is protected by the Constitution because workers need it to bargain fairly. Taking away this power restores balance between workers and employers.”

“Madam Speaker, what were the striking workers in Murdochville demanding in 1957? Why did 1,000 striking workers, 1,000 people working at the Murdochville mine in 1957, go on a long, seven-month, violent strike? They were demanding decent working conditions and a decent wage. Normally, what people want is to be able to obtain decent working conditions through negotiations, through a process of dialogue between the employer and union members, where they discuss each other’s objectives. The employer lays its cards on the table a bit regarding the economic reality, and everyone tries to find ways to share the profits. However, that is not at all what happened in Murdochville in 1957. It remains one of the most significant labour disputes in Quebec’s history. There were violent incidents in Murdochville that year. In April, 27 police officers were sent to stop picketing because, at the time, a Superior Court judge had ruled that the strike was illegal. A box of dynamite was later found in Murdochville. It is hard for me to imagine how violent it was, because I go there quite often. After the discovery of the box of dynamite, which authorities feared might be used for criminal purposes, 50 police officers were sent to Murdochville. After that, the picketing resumed, and on July 14, 1957, Henri Bernatchez, a striker, died in a dynamite explosion on the grounds of the Murdochville mine. Two other strikers were seriously injured. The dispute escalated. It spread to Quebec City. A large march took place in front of the National Assembly in September 1957. There were 7,000 workers from all over Quebec, but still, nothing was really resolved. It was a confrontational strike, a violent strike that unfortunately ended very badly for the strikers. Why am I telling this story? The goal is to find a balance in labour-management relations. We need to ensure that people talk to one another and that we encourage them to reach compromises rather than resorting to discouragement and violence. There was a lot of that in what happened in Murdochville. The employer really did have a very anti-union attitude. Some of the strikers were also very demanding. What we have seen in recent years, and what is particularly relevant to today’s debate, is a growing tendency on the part of the federal government to intervene in labour disputes using a rather unexpected mechanism. One has to acknowledge the ingenuity of the government’s legal advisers, who determined that section 107 of the Canada Labour Code could be used to bring an end to a labour dispute. That provision grants the minister considerable discretion. Traditionally, when a government has chosen to intervene to end a strike, it has done so through special legislation. Such intervention is never ideal, as the preferred outcome is always for the parties to reach a negotiated agreement. The federal government has decided to use section 107 several times in recent years, so much so that it has almost become a habit. It is like when you get a new tool, so you want to use it all the time until you end up over-using it. A number of strikes have been scaled back or brought to a swift halt by the federal government over the past two or three years. That was notably the case with WestJet in 2024. There was also the case of the national railways in August 2024. At the same time, there was the case of Canadian Pacific workers. After that, in November 2024, it was the dock supervisors at a B.C. port. There was also the case of the Port of Québec, where the strike was ended by the federal minister on November 12, 2024, using section 107. Members will recall that, in December, the Canada Post strike was interrupted. More recently, one last really important example is the Air Canada strike. In August 2025, the Air Canada strike was on the horizon. We are talking about 10,000 flight attendants who were ready to go on strike. Within hours of the strike starting, the minister used section 107 of the Canada Labour Code. Basically, section 107 states that the minister can take action by referring the matter to the Canada Industrial Relations Board, which can order an end to the strike. It is a fast track to end a strike and take away workers’ rights. The circumstances at Air Canada were not the same as those in Murdochville. Nevertheless, the strike began and, within hours, the minister invoked section 107. The Canada Industrial Relations Board then issued an order requiring the employees to return to work. However, Air Canada flight attendants refused to comply. They did not comply with that decision and, ultimately, within hours, an agreement was reached. Personally, I see a slippery slope there because, as I was saying, if there is no balance, if people are not respected, conflicts can sometimes escalate. Although the goal is to encourage people to make compromises, sometimes we end up achieving the exact opposite. What makes this situation somewhat unusual, and the reason we support Bill C-247, is that in 2015, in Saskatchewan Federation of Labour v. Saskatchewan, the Supreme Court ruled that the right to strike is essential. This was an important decision that clarified that the right to strike is “an essential part of a meaningful collective bargaining process”. The Supreme Court says that, in order to participate meaningfully in the pursuit of their goals, workers must have the right to strike. It states that the right to strike is constitutionally protected under the right to freedom of association enshrined in section 2 of the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms. I would like to share a few short passages: The right to strike is essential to realizing these values through a collective bargaining process because it permits workers to withdraw their labour in concert when collective bargaining reaches an impasse. Through a strike, workers come together to participate directly in the process of determining their wages, working conditions and the rules that will govern their working lives. The right to strike also promotes equality in the bargaining process. While strike activity itself does not guarantee that a labour dispute will be resolved in any particular manner, or that it will be resolved at all, it is the possibility of a strike which enables workers to negotiate their employment terms on a more equal footing. Here is one more excerpt, which is perhaps the most striking: ...the ability to engage in the collective withdrawal of services in the process of the negotiation of a collective agreement is, and has historically been, the irreducible minimum of the freedom to associate in Canadian labour relations. The right to strike is the “irreducible minimum of the freedom to associate in Canadian labour relations”. Section 107 creates a fast track to removing workers’ right to strike. It throws off the balance. Today’s proposal to simply repeal section 107 does not take all power away from the federal minister, because she can act in other ways, including by appointing conciliators. The idea of special legislation is not off the table either, although this section 107 has been challenged before the Canada Industrial Relations Board, and I suspect in federal court as well. I found no decisions when I was doing my research. I no longer have access to some of the tools I used to use. I did not find a ruling in the open-source database, but this use of section 107 would certainly have warranted judicial examination. I think that the idea of simply repealing it outright would restore the balance of power, without taking away all powers to intervene, yet getting rid of a tool that is too readily accessible and that, unfortunately, has been somewhat misused in recent years.”

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In response to a question from Kevin Lamoureux

“If the question is whether the government should quickly release the $600 million the Liberals promised, my answer is yes. They should do it soon.”

“Mr. Speaker, I did not understand what the member was asking, but if the question was whether the government should quickly release the $600 million that the Liberals promised, then the answer is yes, they should do it soon.”

“This bill lets the minister review an entire region ahead of time and then do whatever he wants. It allows the government to approve many projects all at once using broad rules, instead of checking each project on its own.”

“Mr. Speaker, I thank my colleague for his insightful remarks. Listening to him contributes to our collective understanding of Bill C‑39. One issue that we have homed in on is the possibility of pre-approving projects. If we think about the regions of national interest, and I would like to hear my colleague’s views on this, it is apparent that the regional assessment would be conducted in advance, and the minister would make the decision afterwards. The minister will read the reports, but then he is free to do whatever he wants. As long as a regional assessment has been completed, the minister can proceed as he sees fit. The minister would then be able to designate and describe a region and approve specific categories of projects and criteria. Would my colleague not agree that this is a way of pre-approving projects en masse based on very general criteria, rather than on assessments of the individual projects?”