Madam Speaker, we are here today to speak to Bill C-12, an act respecting certain measures relating to the security of Canada's borders and the integrity of the Canadian immigration system and respecting other related security measures.
When Canadians are asked what feeling is most important to them, they say it is the feeling of safety. That is the basic feeling that Canadians need to have. Personally, I am currently concerned about what we are seeing in this country, and today I am going to talk specifically about what is happening at the ports.
I will give the example of the port of Montreal, which is being used by a criminal network from West Africa. According to an article on the Radio-Canada website:
Canadian border services have recovered hundreds of stolen vehicles that were destined to be shipped to Africa by a network that also specializes in romance scams.
It may seem odd to mention romance fraud in connection with car theft, but that is the reality we are living in. The article explains:
From Montreal to the ports of Cotonou, Benin, or Abidjan, Ivory Coast: an increasing number of vehicles stolen in Canada are being shipped via this major maritime route.
As reported by Radio-Canada, a West African criminal group referred to as “African organized crime”...by Canadian authorities has settled in Quebec over the past few years.
This network specializes in online romance scams, but it's also involved in money laundering and exporting stolen cars from Montreal.
The vehicles are sent directly to West Africa. “Every week, our teams recover more than 20 to 25 [stolen] vehicles” before they leave the country, said Yannick Béland, a Canada Border Services Agency (CBSA) superintendent.
I would like to take a moment to thank all the men and women of the CBSA who are doing such phenomenal work. What they need is additional staff and tools to do their job. One of the tools that the Conservatives would like to put in place are scanners at the ports so they can check the contents of shipping containers.
This is one of our key proposals. It is important because it would provide a way to identify the contents of the containers and cut down on the number of stolen vehicles, which would have a direct impact on Canadians. It would no doubt enable insurers to lower insurance premiums for Canadians, as it would get the job done and reduce the number of stolen vehicles.
As an aside, I arrived on Parliament Hill not quite six months ago, but for eight years before that, I had the privilege of serving as a member of the National Assembly of Quebec. I have seen many bills in my time, and I have to say, I am concerned about the way this Liberal government operates. Right now, the House is also studying a bill to implement affordability measures that will put money back into Canadians' pockets, but it is not as good as what the Conservatives promised. We were more ambitious on behalf of Canadians. Still, Bill C-4 is a step in the right direction for putting money back into taxpayers' pockets.
What we saw yesterday was the Liberals filibustering their own bill. Filibustering means running out the clock to prevent a bill from moving forward. We are seeing this here today. The government added an extra period of time to the agenda so that we could talk about Bill C‑12. I am very pleased to be here with my colleagues today, but one of the reasons we are here is that the government is trying to draw out the legislative process. What I saw yesterday definitely met the definition of what the political world calls filibustering.
For the better part of an hour and a half, one Liberal member after another rose to kill time. Does anyone know how many people who were being paid were in the room yesterday? Fifty. There were 50 people here who are being paid with taxpayer dollars. There were public servants there and they were forced to waste their valuable time. Our public servants have a huge amount of work to do, yet the Liberals invite these officials to appear during consideration of bills and waste their time. This shows a lack of ethics and a lack of respect for the public service, for the work we have to do and for the work public servants do. Yesterday, 50 people had to listen to a string of Liberal members filibustering for an hour and a half. I just wanted to raise that issue.
The Liberals are back at it again today, and we are calling them out for it again. The member opposite brought up the fact that the government added an extra day for consideration of Bill C‑12. Once again, the government is doing this to drag out the process and keep the bill from moving forward. Is Bill C‑12 perfect? No, but we are going to work on it and suggest ways to improve it and make it better, because safety is paramount for all Canadians.
The Conservatives forced the Liberals to abandon Bill C‑2, which would have violated individual freedom and the privacy of Canadians. The Privacy Commissioner even confirmed that the Liberals had not consulted him when they moved to acquire sweeping new powers that would allow warrantless access to Canadians' personal information held by service providers, such as banks and telecommunications companies. Law-abiding Canadians must not lose their freedom in order to make up for the Liberals' failures on borders and immigration.
This bill is important and we will work on it. We know that border security is an issue right now, especially when it comes to fentanyl, a drug that has had devastating consequences for some of our constituents. We must work to strengthen oversight.
The Liberals have brought Bill C‑12 here. As I said, we will examine it in detail to ensure the Liberals do not try to slip a small measure through that would violate the privacy rights of law-abiding Canadians.
In this second attempt at a bill, the government is still not dealing with certain issues, like bail reform. It is also not discussing the practice of arresting and releasing fentanyl and firearms traffickers who take advantage of our porous border in order to attack Canadians. This is an ongoing issue. In our view, it is an important one. We will work to improve the bill and suggest some amendments. We have said that we are willing to work to move this bill forward. We are willing to move Parliament's business along for Canadians, but we need a government that is willing to work with us. Regrettably, what I have witnessed here in the past six months is a dysfunctional, disorganized government that does not help Parliament move forward with business.
Allow me to repeat what happened yesterday with Bill C-4: It was filibustering. We spent an hour and 20 minutes studying the bill in detail. Fifty people being paid by the government were there. It was sad to see. Canadians deserve better. Canadians work hard for their paycheques every day. They send us a large amount of money and expect us to manage it efficiently.
We need to work together for Canadians. We need to bear that in mind every day, out of respect for our constituents. That is what we Conservatives want to do here. We are going to make suggestions, because the safety of Canadians is paramount.