Conservative Leader Pierre Poilievre tore into the Liberal government Tuesday outside the idled Stellantis Brampton Assembly plant. He demanded that Prime Minister Mark Carney fire his industry minister over what he said were about 3,000 Canadian auto jobs sent to the United States.

Standing at a podium reading "SAVE JOBS," with Unifor banners behind the plant fence, Poilievre went after Industry Minister Mélanie Joly's statement that workers "deserve answers."

"She wrote yesterday that workers deserve answers. Minister, they deserve their damn jobs, and Canadians deserve their damn tax dollars," Poilievre said. "In fact, Canadians deserve accountability from your costly, job-killing Liberal government."

He said the Carney Liberals gave the company "15 billion dollars, your tax money, to do what? To take our jobs south."

Poilievre also went after the prime minister's "elbows up" slogan. "Mark Carney promised elbows up. Instead, he elbowed our auto workers in the face," he said.

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Stellantis announced Monday that it has agreed to sell the Brampton plant to armoured-vehicle maker Roshel. Poilievre said any replacement jobs would pay less and go to fewer people.

For months, he said, Joly claimed her "sternly worded letters" would somehow save the jobs, just as the Liberals threatened legal action during the Stelco fight. "The Liberal minister blinked and backed down. No lawsuit, no jobs," he said.

"She's been threatening lawsuits for too many years. She's done nothing," Poilievre added. "That is why today, the Official Opposition is calling for the Liberal Prime Minister to fire his failed, costly, job-killing Liberal industry minister."

He also quoted Unifor, which called the sale "a critical failure of the national auto strategy" that "breaks the federal government's commitment to protect auto workers in the US trade war."

The Conservatives want Ottawa to sue Stellantis to get the tax dollars back and fight for a tariff-free auto pact. They also want it to scrap its "backdoor EV mandates," block Chinese EVs and take the GST off Canadian-made vehicles.

Poilievre said Canada built 2.2 million vehicles in 2016 but only 1.2 million today. Much of that decline happened while François-Philippe Champagne, now Carney's finance minister, ran the industry file.

Pressed on what legal power Ottawa has to stop the sale, Poilievre said the Liberals are hiding behind confidentiality. "The Liberals could release the contract and tell Canadians what they got for the billions of tax dollars they handed over."