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The important fact that Americans just put in place a significant tax reform piece that significantly lowered taxes in the US while we're doing the exact opposite in Canada. So there are so many taxes that were increasing Canada if you're both at the federal and provincial levels. Carbon taxes, CPT increases, EI increases, the small business tax increases. We're doing all of these things to increase the tax burden on small businesses, on families, on single Canadians, on basically everything.
Our major competitor to the south and our major trading partner is doing the exact opposite. So I'm worried we often talk about the impact of increased taxes we're going to have on the spending power and the ability of families and single Canadians to make ends meet. I'm also worried about next year, the fact that we're losing our competitive advantage on the continent. And that's a huge problem.
But I'm sure my colleagues will want to talk about the impact that it has on every single Canadian as well. Yeah, Candice, when it comes to the taxation, you look at the fact that taxes are going to be changed and going to be going up, new ones introduced. At the same time, we have a government that is running heavily into a deficit territory far more than they said that they would. And so our debt structure, federally, is going to collide with increased taxes.
So your thoughts on that? Well, we have a government that has messed up pretty well. Everything that they've set their hands to do. For sure, they have messed up the country's finances.
Now, they were elected on a promise to reduce taxes for the middle class. The evidence has shown that the middle class taxes have actually gone up. They, as you said, introduced and are going to be a commitment to carbon tax. The carbon tax will do nothing to reduce global emissions.
Carbon tax that will only fill government coffers. And then you will recall in the summer when they laid out their paper regarding small business taxes, which was a complete disaster. And even though they kind of scaled it back, what has happened, Roy, it has created so much uncertainty among small businesses. And, you know, Michelle talks about competitiveness.
I think on a large scale when we're talking about energy investments, large investment in Canada, that would be going south. But I think we look at small businesses and whether people will start a small business in Canada or decide to operate a thousand of the borders. I think on that front, we're going to see a lot of business as well. So, you know, we just see a government that has a spending problem.
And they're, and I'm having started talking about how they're taxing vulnerable Canadians. People, diabetes are men and women in uniform. People who actually are contributing a lot to Canada and whether it's a $1,600 a year tax credit. That means something for them.
But this government has a spending problem and they're taxing Canadians to debt virtually. Senator Vatters, you're from Saskatchewan where there's been a bit of a dual, there was going to be a dual at high noon between Prime Minister Trudeau and Premier Wall over the issue of carbon tax. I don't know what's going to happen with the new premier and the government. But how does this carbon tax, when you look at Saskatchewan, and then you'll be broad-based in more out of cross Canada, how does this carbon tax, what did it speak of to you?
Well, in Saskatchewan, we have continued to fight against that. And I know that whoever the new Saskatchewan party leader is, who will become the next premier at Saskatchewan, they will continue on the fight of Premier Wall because every single leadership contender in Saskatchewan for the first party is against the carbon tax strongly. So, this is something that we've continued to fight against. And Minister McKenna and Prime Minister Trudeau have continued to avoid giving us the details of the carbon tax that they're planning to impose on us, which is completely unfair.
I mean, I asked Minister McKenna about this, and then a question period 11 months ago, and then she didn't give me an answer as to what the details were going to be. She came back, I asked her again, her only answer was, Hope Springs Eternal, and she was hoping that the next Saskatchewan party premier was going to be in favor of the carbon tax, which is completely misguided. So, now we hear talks that are going to impose it on us in this coming September if we don't have it in place, that we're not going to have it in place because we're against it. This is not something that helps the environment.
It's only something that helps the Liberal coffers. And keep in mind that, Australia in 2014, after they'd introduced and passed and had in place for a period of time, are carbon tax in 2014, Australia said, no, it's hurting our economy, it's hurting our families, it's hurting our businesses, and they repealed the carbon tax. So, there's an example there, an economy that's quite similar to ours, of the carbon tax being an utter failure. I want to talk to you about ethics.
We're going to take a break and we'll come back and we'll talk about ethics in government ethics and parliament. We have a Prime Minister who four times now, as violated ethics, according to the ethics commissioner, we have a finance minister who also has defined a massive sum of $200 for being an ethical violation of the expectations of parliament. And just ethical realities, ethical expectations of all members of Canada's federal government. We'll come back with our guests.
Candice Bergen, the MP for Portage Lisker, and Michelle Rimple, Calgary, Noz Hill, and Denise Mather, Senator from Saskatchewan. It's the Roy Green Show, and it's the chorus radio network. Roy will take no or no comment sitting down. Yes, he's a Roy Green Show.
On the chorus radio network. Just so you know, we've invited Liberal MPs and Senators and Cabinet Ministers and the Prime Minister to be on this program and none of them have found it possible. Even we're in contact with the PMO and they got back in touch with me. We exchanged emails.
We have phone calls and we're still waiting for Mr. Trudeau to show up on this program. Michelle Rimple is one of the conservative member of Parliament for Calgary's Noz Hill writing. And it's Bergen MP for Portage Lisker in Manitoba and Senator Denise Batter from Saskatchewan.
A lot has been said about the issue of ethics. We have the Prime Minister being challenged directly by the commissioner in four times he's violated the ethics rules. The finance minister has also had his issues. Is ethical behavior or ethical standards a difficult accomplishment in Canada's Parliament?
Do you walk around talking to each other regardless of party affiliation and saying, what do I do in this situation? What do I do in that situation? Do people generally understand what the ethical expectations are? Senator, let me start with you.
Yeah, it's really not that difficult. They're pretty clear cut, particularly in the case of Prime Minister Trudeau. I mean, this is the first sitting Prime Minister to have been found to have broken federal law and broke it in four places, the conflict to be in trust act. So it seems to me that him and his government, they're suffering from an entitlement complex.
They can't relate to everyday Canadians and instead they're dodging consequences and they seem to be allergic to accountability. Even he can't defend his own actions on this. As we saw in the press conference, he kind of shorted out there for a bit and went about a question from Rosemary Barton. But time and again, we see him and his minister is messing up either with bad behavior or ethics violations.
And on the minister's end of it, every single time the Prime Minister refuses to fire them in the case of Mr. Tutu, Mr. Sajan, Mr. Hader, Mr.
Marno. And instead it's the Prime Minister who ultimately bears the responsibility for all of this because he selected all of those people for cabinet positions and he chooses to keep them there. He could have put Bill Marno into almost any other cabinet portfolio in order to avoid the types of potential conflicts and interests that he should have known where they are and where they are. With Mr.
Marno's substantial financial holdings were widely reported before he was appointed as finance minister. But instead he chose to place him as finance minister and he chooses to keep him there now when there are substantial questions about both his ethical standards and how he's chosen to address that. And also with his handling of the economy. We have massive deficits right now which were two or three times what the Liberals even promised they would be.
Right. Of course, we know about just balance themselves. Michelle Rample, what about the issue of ethics for members of Canada's Parliament? I know that there are guidelines or there are expectations issued that each MP receives.
I've seen them. I have a copy of them in actually my office. Is there any gray area, any nebulous concerns about or any concerns about nebulous areas as far as ethics are concerned or is it just fundamentally understandable? This is what you should do and this is what you shouldn't do.
I guess I would describe it as certainly in the case of the Prime Minister and the Finance Minister. Just a lack of understanding on what the role of a public servant is. Right. So, you know, in the case of the Prime Minister, he needs to understand that his salary is paid for by the taxpayers of Canada to work to bring good government.
It is not paid to use his position to take free vacations to a private island that's owned by somebody who Robbie's or who's foundation of the federal government for grant funding. That's not rocket science, is it? No, I guess there's all this discussion now and I'm like, well, what should we do with the Accountability Act and how is it going to be held accountable? I mean, obviously I think our party, our leaders, done a really good job of pointing out just how ridiculous this is.
But now it's really up to us in Parliament, but it's also up to every single Canadian, including those who voted for Mr. Trudeau to say, you know what, this is not what I voted you to do. This is not why I pay your salary. And for me, this is something that every Canadian is now up to Canadians to decide whether or not they sanction this behaviour.
And that needs to be reflected in the next federal election. We're certainly going to keep putting attention on it. But I hope that Canadians remember this because to me, it's a misunderstanding of what your role is. Your role isn't to take free vacations to private, billionaire islands.
It just seems really bizarre to me. I'm not going to ask you, I'll offer you to answer each question because then we won't get through the questions, a number of questions that I have. So maybe one or two, I'll ask you to answer your specific questions. If there's a question you really want to get at and I want to ask you, by all means tell me that and we'll have you answer it.
Now, the two federal and two new federal party leaders in 2017, Mr. Sheer and Mr. Singh, would you say that your leader has done an adequate and admirable or not so good job of getting out there and getting to know Canadians? I've been critical of Mr.
Sheer's invisibility too frequently. I see him in question period, but not all that much. Candice, thoughts on that? Well, I'm the House Leader.
So I'm in the House of Commons every day and I know certainly Andrew Sheer is doing, as you said, a very visible in question period, which is one of the really the only tools that we have to hold the government to account. And when you think about all the ethical lapses and scandals that have happened, they would only have been brought to light, they were only brought to light because of his opposition, brought into light. But I do know as well that Andrew Sheer has been out traveling across the country since he was made leader at the end of May, meeting people, talking to people. Now, you know what, Roy, it might not be places where the media is going to be covering it.
So not everybody might see it. You may not see it or hear about it and fair enough. But I know and I know our caucus knows and the people who have been meeting him know that he's been getting out and traveling across the country. That's fair to say.
But he has a responsibility as well if he's going to want to be prime minister to be heard and seen by as many Canadians as he possibly can and getting the message out, getting his message out. If he's going to small communities, that's fine. He should. But if he's going somewhere where media aren't going to cover him, maybe there's some media bias on who we won't bother covering Sheer today because there's a runaway dog.
But I don't think that he's doing the job that he should be doing, neither is Mr. Singh, of getting out and maximizing exposure, particularly at the time, Mr. Trudeau has some really serious problems. Well, I mean, I guess we can agree to disagree.
Although I will say that Andrew would be the first to tell you that he wants to meet more people and be more visible and he's working very hard at that. But we already know Andrew Sheer is not going to be Justin Trudeau on the celebrity front. That is not going to be where he's trying to take the battleground. He's not going to go somewhere in hopes that there's going to be thousands of people turn out.
What he wants to do is talk to people and tell them what the message that conservatives have. The message that we have and the policy and the different direction that we want to take the country. And so, yeah, you know what, why? Sometimes that means the church basement when you're at the legions or at the grocery store or some of these places, you may not get the coverage.
But you got to start one step at a time. And I do know Andrew Sheer works incredibly hard. He understands hard work. He also is incredibly personable.
People like what they're seeing when they meet him. And so we encourage him, we support him, and we just want to keep that scene to get out there and do what he's doing. He's a greater extent. Well, that's good.
We have a minute and we're going to take a break. If I can just get 10 seconds quickly from you, Michelle, and from you, Senator Batter, is just on Andrew Sheer. Michelle, just 10 seconds. You know, I think Andrew's come a long way in the very short months since the end of our leadership race.
I don't think that the point that you're making is lost on him. I think he understands the critical necessity of getting out in front of Canadians and also taking a very strong stance against the damaging policies that we're seeing from the Liberals. It also prevents preventing Canadians with a vision of something that they can vote for that's under our party banner. So, you know, I think that he is working hard.
This is going to be a big goal for him next year. And certainly, he's got a lot of strong caucus members that are going to work on that goal. Okay, we're going to come back to the committee. We'll come back and we'll continue with our hour with Michelle Rample, Candace Berg, and both Conservative Members of Parliament and these matters, Conservative Senator, right after this.
And you're not facing a putty or old senator who can't fight back. You're facing yourself. That was awful. The CBC interviewing the Prime Minister.
That was really a good question, actually. We have with us and it's an honor to have them on the program ending 2017, heading to 2018 on the chorus radio network across this country. Our is Michelle Rample, who's a Conservative Member Parliament for Nosed Hill writing and Cal Grey, Candace Berg, and Portage Lisker in Manitoba, and Denise Batter, Senator from Saskatchewan. Let me go on to something else here and that's immigration and our borders.
What needs to be said about the immigration issue, and I know Michelle and I had a conversation a few weeks ago where you were, you had confronted the immigration minister on the FGM issue and the new Canadian guide for newcomers to Canada. What needs to be said about the immigration issue and the borders and particularly when the Prime Minister comes up makes up his own definition of people who are breaking the law into Canada, calling them irregular crossings. So I'll start with you, Michelle, on this issue with immigration. It's very simple.
Canada, Canada's immigration system needs to function under two very simple points. The first is people coming into Canada must do it to a plan and orderly and legal system, and then we also have to make sure that people that are coming to Canada are supported and expected to integrate into the fabric of Canada's economy and into our social system. So what does that mean and where is the government's tailing? So on the first component, the illegal border crossing issue, I think, is one of the biggest public policy sales in Canada.
In recent Canadian history, when you think about it, there were nearly 40,000 people who illegally crossed the border into Canada and had benefits such as health care and work permits expedited when there are hundreds of thousands, if not millions of people around the world, that want to come to this country but want to do it by playing by the rule. And if not fair, if not fair, and it's, I think, just, it undermines the integrity of our system. The second component with regard to integration is I look at the experience that some of our recent refugees have had in the country over the last year and a half, and I think that that is a big failure. So the government sent a lot of efforts taking photo ops with refugees when they came into the country, but now the rubber is really hitting the road.
Do you have people who have spent the majority of their lives in a war zone? What is the government doing to ensure that they can speak English or French? They become employed over the long term that we're talking about, I even think about from these children that are going into schools and have special needs because of their trauma. These are all things that we have to talk about.
The reality is that the government brought 25,000 crossed people here as government assisted refugees and had no plan in place to deal with that. And at the same time, they turned a blind eye to genocide survivors such as the Yazidis, you and I have spent a lot of time talking about that. It's just such a complete failure. And the government expects Canadians to let this debate disintegrate down into, you know, just shut the, completely shut the doors.
You know, they want to put different labels on that debate where I think a lot of Canadians are saying we support immigration, but we expect you to do it right. And we're not going to let you off the hook for just a complete failure. The government needs to close the loophole and face their country agreement that allows this activity to happen for people to cross the border and still claim the asylum in Canada, across the border illegally. They need to be putting a lot more thought into how many people are coming to the country with regard to how that matches our economic needs and the integration support that's required therein.
And they need to make sure that our screening processes and that our support programs are functioning and we know that they're not the level they need to be. So it's a big debate and one that they have to look at in the New Year. All right, Candice, let me steer you toward the issue of refugees coming into Canada. And I'm doing this because earlier today and yesterday I saw stories that in Germany, from New Year's Eve in Berlin, there's an area that's being put aside where the major New Year celebrations are taking place.
An area has been set aside for women to go to where they can feel safe if they find themselves in a situation where they might be being approached in a way that is totally inappropriate and that they don't want to have happened. And it's a reflection on what happened in Cologne. I think it was in 2016 and it's been talked about a great deal that with Angela Merkel bringing more than a million or allowing more than a million migrants into Germany, it has changed the dynamic of the country and it's created situations such as the one at the train station in Cologne. And now they have a safe area planned for Berlin.
Is there anything from that experience in Germany that's being reported on that is important to the issue of refugees coming to Canada? And we remember the Prime Minister tweeted out that, you know, if you're facing religious or other, I forget the word that he used, but if you're being unfairly treated then Canada will welcome you. So can you speak to that please? Well, it was the Prime Minister's irresponsible tweet that really started the whole influx of illegal migrants.
And many of them actually are coming at orders close to my end in my writing of 40's lizards. So I'm a Manitoba and I have Emerson very close to where I live as well as go right now. I think there are two issues one that you're talking about. First of all is Syrian refugees.
And I know that Canadians right across the country want to be able to support and help people who were fleeing for their very life and want to be able to help them in Canada. We did, Michelle was working very hard asking some very important and serious questions of the government in terms of what they were doing too, as Michelle talked about, helping people when they get to Canada but also making sure that they are screened properly. We never got answers. And then in the midst of that would win the Prime Minister's sent out this tweet, Canada welcomed everyone and that's when the illegal migrants issue started.
You know, what's interesting, when you look at the immigration system over the last 20, 30 years under previous liberal governments and conservative governments, it's been fairly, fairly consistent. There may have been some some different differences in political parties that were in government. Until now, Justin Trudeau has made such a mess of this entire file and this whole issue. And I agree with Michelle, this is a huge issue that we don't even know the ramifications and people in Canada want to help.
They want to believe the best of those who are coming here. They want to see them contribute and be part of our accounts and our community. But because Trudeau is dismissing really important questions, he actually calls people names. If you ask a question, Trudeau just says, oh, you probably are racist and you're not asking with the right motive.
That's really damaging. That's divisive. And so unless the government in the case Trudeau will answer these questions and stop with some of this irresponsible stuff that just gives him more social media and more photos, this is only a problem that's going to grow and we really don't know where it might be. You know, Mr.
Trudeau also in 2015 said, and we played his clip many times where he said in Winnipeg that as he wanted, we wanted to understand that it was his initiative that any convicted terrorist who's a dual citizen in this country, any convicted terrorist would not lose his or her Canadian citizenship as legislation passed by the Stephen Harper government was allowing to be done and was in fact done with one of the leaders of the Toronto 18. He said convicted terrorists would not lose their Canadian citizenship because I'm not sure that's when he said a Canadian is a Canadian is a Canadian. But that was not going to happen. The past Bill C6 which essentially overturned C24 and Mr.
I forget his name, got his, had his Canadian citizenship returned in July of this year. So there's a lot to be dealt with on the issue of refugees. When we come back, I still want to try to get in something about Omar Carter and pipelines, huge issue for the economy of this country. But there's something that's planned for the Senate, at least the Prime Minister wants it for the Senate.
A lot said about the Senate in this country and we'll ask Senator Batter's about that when he returns. Stay with us. Big stories and even their guests. This is the Roy Green Show on the chorus radio network.
In some parts of the world, it's already 2018, we're counting down and helping us do that with the final program, the final hour of the final program for 2017. On the Roy Green Show on the chorus radio network, we are joined by three members of the Conservative Party, Michelle Remple, the MP for No-Sill in Calgary, Portage Lisker, MP in Manitoba, Candace, Bergen and Denise Batter's the scotch on Senator Batter's when a lot has been said about the Senate, the viability of the Senate, the lack of importance of the Senate and on and on and on. Now Mr. Trudeau decided he didn't want any particular liberal caucus in the Senate, but he has one.
We know that. But from what I understand, he's also looking at changes to the way the Senate operates and he's carrying on with this idea about no official opposition. What's going on? Yeah, well the Trudeau government, alarmingly, their desired goal is to actually eliminate opposition in the Senate.
Earlier this year, the Trudeau government brought forward a quote on quote discussion paper to be a debat and opposition in the House of Commons and my excellent colleagues there fought that off. But similar efforts continue to be used by the Trudeau government in the Senate and they're not backing down on those yet. I mean, Justin Trudeau previously stated that he had made his china for their basic dictatorship and then when he was recently asked in China what country he admired, he replied Britain but he replied that because of their programming of legislation. Well, if Justin Trudeau wants to push his legislation through, he should have to play a political consequence for that political choice.
And he also kicked his liberal senators out of caucus for political reasons to avoid consequences dealing with our auditor general situation. So I don't think we should completely reshape our parliamentary system in the Senate, a system that's functioned quite well for 150 years all to satisfy the political wins of Justin Trudeau. What we have right now in the Senate, we have this new independent Senate, they like to call it, well this is smoke and mirrors. Independence are not more independent than partisan senators.
The average voting percentage with the Trudeau government of an independent senator is 95%. What we have right now is we have basically a liberal government status quo system where we're having a liberal Prime Minister appoint people who were inclined to vote with the Liberals in very large numbers. We have a confusing situation and we also have an expensive situation. We have two leadership groups.
Now we have four. Well, let's talk about countries. The Prime Minister admires. I thought I was scared about that.
I can be wrong. Yes, I do. On the issue of, and this is one where our callers have said and vowed they would not forget, and they would not forget in 2019. And that was the time Mr.
Trudeau got the check for $10.5 million to Omar Carter, who's a self-confessed terrorist and murderer, self-confessed. And he argues, Trudeau argues, well, he's saving Canadians money. He's angry that he had to do this, but if he had to run its course in court, it would have cost $30 million. He has no idea what he's talking about because who knows what it would have cost?
Maybe nothing. You can't pre-sage what's going to happen in a court of law, but Canadians are angry and upset with that. Now, Mr. Trudeau has said that he thinks that returning ISIS terrorists who joined ISIS with the objective of participating in the kind of terrible, horrific mayhem that we've seen, he thinks they could be extraordinarily positive voices in this country.
So we spoke about that yesterday and there's a great deal of anger from our callers across Canada. Let me go back to you, Michelle, on this one. I'll just open the door. Go ahead.
I guess I'll touch on the issue of terrorists who have fought with ISIS, who have an association with Canada, who's traveled to fight with ISIS and then have come back to Canada. I've sat in rooms with women who were held captive by ISIS and sold on their sex-laid market by numerous men, raped dozens of times a day by different men in the name of ISIS's terrorist death cults, disgusting in human mantra. All I can think about is when Justin Trudeau gets up and talks about rehabilitation as the key priority, or talks about the program where the government has spent $600,000 of taxpayer money for a foundation that is focusing on writing poetry regarding ISIS, these are the sort of things that make Canadians lose faith in the ability to gain justice for people who have seen atrocities committed to them. The reality is that ISIS committed genocide.
When the Prime Minister or any of his ministers or any liberal stands up and says, oh, never again. And then says, hold on a second, our first priority isn't bringing these criminals to justice or suggesting that somehow it's a split objective. I'm just, you know, attending the wrong message isn't the right thing to say, because I think about what I would be feeling if I was one of these women. And the reality is that I'm an advocate for these women.
And it makes me want to vomit in my mouth. It infuriates me. I actually, it's difficult to sort of maintain, I'm just so angry. Okay, so let me.
Let me do this. It's so fundamentally wrong. It is. First priority is that these people should be brought to justice.
These terrorists, these criminals, these murderers, these death cultists need to be brought to justice. And Canada needs to be at the forefront of this internationally, not just at home, but on international criminal court convictions as well. Yeah. And I'm going to stay with you, Michelle, because the next question has to do with energy, has to do with pipelines, has to do with using our natural resources in this country to the benefit of people in Canada that is using our resources for Canadians and also exporting them so that we have income coming in, which seems to escape some people.
As an Albertan, as an Alberta member of Parliament, please answer that one for us. Well, the only thing I can give Justin Trudeau credit for is that he was smarter than his father and that he didn't label it in the National Energy Program. Every single thing that Justin Trudeau has done to come into office has been to systemically dismantle any prospect of the energy sector being viable in Canada from changes to the regulatory review process for major resource projects, making that political. His cabinet overturned the arm's length decision made by the NEB on the gateway pipeline to the carbon tax, to the tanker ban, to all of these different regulations, regulatory uncertainty, the small business tax changes.
He has done everything that he possibly can to say the energy sector should not operate in Canada, even though even calling it like dirty jobs. It can be very interesting in 2018 as equalization payments become a topic of discussion again. I think the renegotiation process happens next year. All of a sudden Ontario that is the biggest sub-national debt in the country that has relied upon the transfer payments from the development of natural resources.
By the way, in some of the most environmentally responsible conditions in the world, all of a sudden we're going to have to start having a conversation about what Justin Trudeau thinks the economy is going to actually do after all of these jobs are relocated to the US. I just think that it's so short-sighted, it's ridiculous, it ignores the fact that Canada has a sustainable development agenda, and he's completely ruined by province, and I'll continue to hold him to account for that. It's disgusting. And yeah, he doesn't really have no friends here.
I have to jump in because this time the clock got us on the year got us. So, can't fight that. I thank you all three for joining us for the last hour of the program of 2017. Look forward to 2018 and I always look forward to a better year than the last one, and I hope that we can count on you all coming back and joining us on the program.
Thanks for having us. I'd love to do that. Happy New Year to you and all your listeners. Thank you, Senator.
Senator Denise Batter, members of Parliament, Michelle Rample and Candice Bergen on the Roy Green Show.