From LifeSiteNews

By Clare Marie Merkowsky

Conservative MP Corey Tochor argued the term “corrupt” is an accurate description of Trudeau and his government.   

“If you ask the Ethics Commissioner about all of the infractions that the Prime Minister has been charged and convicted with on corruption, you will find the truth to be that this is a corrupt government and Prime Minister”

Liberals are pushing for the word “corrupt” to be banned in Parliament amid ongoing ethics scandals within the Trudeau government.  

On April 19, Liberal Member of Parliament (MP) Mark Gerretsen moved to prohibit MPs from referring to Prime Minister Justin Trudeau and his government as “corrupt,” arguing it is disrespectful towards the Liberal government.  

“My point is that, today, during question period, the member for Regina—Wascana referred to the Prime Minister as ‘corrupt’ and to the government as ‘corrupt,’” he told the House of Commons.  

“Although he did it today, it has been done a number of times in the House,” he continued. “I would say that terminology specifically goes against Standing Order 18.” 

The House of Commons’ Standing Order 18 regulates speech within the House to ensure that MPs do not use disrespectful or offensive language.  

“No member shall speak disrespectfully of the Sovereign, nor of any of the royal family, nor of the Governor General or the person administering the Government of Canada; nor use offensive words against either House, or against any member thereof,” it states. “No member may reflect upon any vote of the House, except for the purpose of moving that such vote be rescinded.”  

“I would encourage the Chair, during this time of reflection over that week that he indicated he was going to do that, to consider my comment on this and to weigh into whether or not this is actually,” Gerretsen added before being interrupted by Conservative MPs calling for a debate. 

However, Gerretsen refused to debate his suggestion, instead pushing for Conservatives to be censored. Gerretsen’s recommendation was supported by Bloc Quebecois MP Martin Champoux.  

“I would like to build on what my colleague just said,” Champoux said. “I actually raised a point of order about this yesterday with the Speaker, who was in the chair at the time, to ask him to once again set out strict rules and clear guidelines for members to follow.” 

“That would help us to better understand how far we can go,” he argued. “Right now and for the past few months, there has been a lack of consistency in the way freedom of expression is interpreted in the House and in the way measures are applied when members cross the line or do not follow the guidelines, which, again, are not exactly clear.” 

However, Conservative MP Corey Tochor argued the term “corrupt” is an accurate description of Trudeau and his government.   

“If you ask the Ethics Commissioner about all of the infractions that the Prime Minister has been charged and convicted with on corruption, you will find the truth to be that this is a corrupt government and Prime Minister,” he declared.  

Indeed, between the ArriveCAN app scandal, alleged Chinese election meddling and the SNC-Lavalin affair, Canadian MPs seem well within their rights to call, or at least remain concerned, that Trudeau and his government are “corrupt.” 

So, why are Liberals moving to have the term banned? 

It appears Trudeau and his government prefer Canadians remain unaware of past and ongoing corruption scandals, preferring to silence those who remain unconvinced by Liberal Party propaganda.  

In the last few years of Trudeau’s near-decade reign, the prime minister and his Liberals have become increasingly intolerant of opposing views, infamously labelling their critics during the COVID-era as “right-winged extremists” and a “small fringe minority.”   

Unfortunately, it seems this trend is only going to continue.

As LifeSiteNews recently reported, law professor Dr. Michael Geist warned that the Trudeau government is “ready” to “gaslight” opponents of Bill C-63, a proposed law that could lead to jail time for vaguely defined online “hate speech” infractions.  

While the banning of the word “corrupt” in Parliament may not yet be implemented, who is to say that if Bill C-63 is passed that the Trudeau government won’t decide to consider such accusations of corruption as meeting the definition of online “hate speech.”

Indeed, perhaps the Liberals’ move to ban the word “corrupt” should be considered a sign that they know they’ve lost the public’s trust and are acutely aware silencing opposition is their only option.

In fact, it would appear that Trudeau’s only response to dismal polling figures with respect to his scandal-plagued government’s popularity is to double down on censorship, rather than consider why citizens feel the way they do.

As the late U.S. President Harry S. Truman warned: “Once a government is committed to the principle of silencing the voice of opposition, it has only one way to go, and that is down the path of increasingly repressive measures, until it becomes a source of terror to all its citizens and creates a country where everyone lives in fear.” 

From the C2C Journal

By Gwyn Morgan

It is Prime Minister Justin Trudeau’s contention there’s no “business case” for exporting Canada’s abundant, inexpensively produced natural gas as LNG. But Canadians might do well to politely decline management consulting advice from a former substitute drama teacher who was born into wealth and has never had to meet a payroll, balance a budget or make a sale. Bluntly stated, someone who has shown no evidence of being able to run the proverbial lemonade stand. And one whose real agenda, the evidence shows, is to strangle the nation’s most productive and wealth-generating industry. With the first LNG ship finally expected to dock at Kitimat, B.C. over the next year and load Canada’s first-ever LNG export cargo, Gwyn Morgan lays out the business and environmental cases for ramping up our LNG exports – and having them count towards Canada’s greenhouse gas reduction targets.

Pierre Poilievre’s Axe the (carbon) Tax campaign is a spectacular success. But the Conservative Party of Canada needs its own plan to reduce greenhouse gas emissions from fossil fuels. Paradoxically, it’s a fossil fuel that provides much of the answer.

Canada’s rich endowment of natural gas resources offers an immense opportunity to reduce global carbon dioxide (CO₂) emissions while also helping to rescue the Liberal-government-ravaged Canadian economy by exporting liquefied natural gas (LNG) to China, Japan, South Korea and the other coal-dependent Asia-Pacific countries. Switching from coal to natural gas for producing electricity and generating heat for buildings and industrial processes can typically reduce CO₂ emissions by 50 percent for the same unit of output, while all-but eliminating the toxic compounds and lung-clogging particulates emitted from burning coal that shorten the lives of millions living in smog-stricken Asian cities.

More natural gas is urgently needed, since countries throughout Asia – especially China and India – are currently adding even more coal-burning power plants to meet rapidly growing electricity demand. The benefits of fuel-switching are not speculation, but a proven result: the United States’ pronounced switch starting in the mid-2000s from coal to natural gas for electricity materially reduced that country’s CO₂ emissions (see accompanying graph), nearly equalling the entire European Union’s emissions cuts, as I wrote about in this previous column.

A study by respected consulting firm Wood Mackenzie, released in late 2022, determined the following:

But through a decade of trying to navigate Canada’s increasingly obstructive and Byzantine regulatory process, project proponents dropped out one by one. Today LNG Canada is the only one of those major projects left standing. (Two much smaller LNG projects, Woodfibre LNG in Howe Sound at Squamish, and Cedar LNG just a few kilometres from the LNG Canada project, are also proceeding, and one other large project proposed by the Nisga’a First Nation is making regulatory progress.) LNG Canada succeeded only because South African project leader Andy Calitz, backed by the enthusiasm of the Haisla Nation which saw the immense potential to create a self-sustaining, wealth-generating economy for its people, refused to give up.

After five years of construction, the LNG Canada liquefaction facility and loading terminal are nearing completion, with the first LNG ship scheduled to sail to China in 2025 (possibly even this year). The Kitimat plant itself is just one component of Canada’s first LNG export project. TC Energy Corp.’s (formerly TransCanada Pipelines) $15 billion, recently completed Coastal GasLink pipeline will carry the required natural gas from the northeastern B.C. gas fields to the Kitimat terminal. And additional billions of dollars have been invested in drilling natural gas wells, proving up the immense reserves needed to feed the LNG facility for decades to come, and constructing field production systems.

The economic benefits are myriad. Aside from the jobs created and the wealth generated for the participating companies, B.C.’s annual natural gas royalties are forecast to double from $700 million in 2024 to $1.4 billion in 2027. Benefits for First Nations include significant employment and business opportunities, such as HaiSea Marine’s 50 percent interest in a $500 million contract.

And that’s just LNG Canada’s Phase 1, which will produce 14 million tonnes per annum (mtpa) of LNG, or approximately 1.8 billion cubic feet (bcf) per day. With that one project coming on-stream, about 10 percent of Canada’s total natural gas production will be exported to international markets, earning premium prices. Construction of Phase 2 is scheduled to begin in 2026 and will double the facility’s output, with first delivery scheduled for 2032. A report from Canada Action estimates that completion of both phases will reduce CO₂ emissions in Asian countries as much as would removing 18 million cars from Canadian roads. That is a far more efficient and realistic way of reducing emissions than the Trudeau government’s current scheme to force everyone into electric vehicles within a decade.

A major barrier for LNG project sponsors has been Canadian regulators’ fixation on a project’s domestic emissions – which come mainly from producing the energy needed to operate the liquefaction and storage process and loading facility. These emissions are miniscule compared to the enormous emissions reductions when natural gas is used instead of coal in consuming countries. But in their zeal to force Canada to “net zero” emissions, government authorities initially tried to veto LNG Canada generating its electricity and compression power using some of the natural gas that will be already piped to the site, insisting instead upon hydroelectric power. This seriously delayed the project due to the need for B.C. Hydro to first build a new dam to supply the required power, along with a new, $3 billion transmission line that has not even begun its environmental review process.

Regulators finally waived their objection so the project could be finished, and it will initially use natural gas for power. But the same objection is now being raised with respect to another major LNG venture proposed in the same region. The Ksi Lisims LNG project would utilize a floating liquefaction and loading facility docked at lands owned by the Nisga’a First Nation north of Prince Rupert. Its natural gas would be supplied through an already-approved but never-built pipeline planned for one of the cancelled LNG projects. The $10 billion venture would have approximately two-thirds the capacity of LNG Canada Phase 1. The facility would be powered by hydroelectricity.

Ksi Lisims sounds like a great addition to Canada’s modest LNG lineup, one that British Columbians should applaud. Instead, the proponents have been assailed by objections over the greenhouse gas emissions from the facility and the natural gas production process, and concurrently the B.C. Wilderness Committee is calling on the province’s NDP government to veto any further LNG development. None of these zealots acknowledge the vastly greater reduction of greenhouse gas emissions that will be achieved as consuming countries switch to natural gas.

Prior to the December 2018 UN Climate Change Conference in Katowice, Poland, Canada’s Conservative Party urged leaders of their nation’s delegation to propose that the use of imported natural gas to displace coal and thereby reduce emissions in one country should count towards the exporting country’s emissions reduction targets. But this made far too much sense for our Prime Minister and his team of anti-fossil-fuel eco-zealots. A new federal government that encourages LNG projects might well see a return of those other big sponsors that were driven off.

And that brings us back to Pierre Poilievre and the need for a Conservative alternative to Trudeau’s carbon tax. LNG export would be not only vastly superior in reducing emissions, it would also create tens of billions of dollars in economic benefits for a beleaguered Canadian private sector. It is beyond high time. A Macdonald-Laurier Institute report, Estimating the True Size of Government in Canada, concludes that Canada’s private sector has shrunk to just 36 percent of the nation’s GDP. That’s right – Canada’s public sector now represents nearly two-thirds of the Canadian economy, if one includes in that measure the vast amounts governments spend on tax credits and other tax-related expenditures, plus the economic impacts of regulating the pricing or outputs of private industries. This is appalling.

Even more incomprehensible is a research report from the Harvard Kennedy School noting that “Communist” China’s private sector generates “approximately 60% of China’s GDP, 70% of its innovative capacity, 80% of urban employment and 90% of new jobs.” By those measures, the private sector in ostensibly free and democratic Canada, with its allegedly market-based economy, has been reduced to barely half the relative size of the private sector in authoritarian China.

It is clear that for Canada, getting out of the way of privately-driven growth in LNG exports would be a vastly superior environmental alternative to Trudeau’s economically destructive and politically divisive carbon tax, while also helping to reverse the decline of what was once a proud, thriving nation into an indebted, unproductive, government-dominated basket case.

Gwyn Morgan is a retired business leader who was a director of five global corporations.