Bill C-19

Budget Implementation Act, 2022, No. 1

An Act to implement certain provisions of the budget tabled in Parliament on April 7, 2022 and other measures

Part 1 implements certain income tax measures by
(a) providing a Labour Mobility Deduction for the temporary relocation of tradespeople to a work location;
(b) allowing for the immediate expensing of eligible property by certain Canadian businesses;
(c) allowing the Children’s Special Allowance to be paid in respect of a child who is maintained by an Indigenous governing body and providing consistent tax treatment of kinship care providers and foster parents receiving financial assistance from an Indigenous governing body and those receiving such assistance from a provincial government;
(d) doubling the allowable qualifying expense limit under the Home Accessibility Tax Credit;
(e) expanding the criteria for the mental functions impairment eligibility as well as the life-sustaining therapy category eligibility for the Disability Tax Credit;
(f) providing clarity in respect of the determination of the one-time additional payment under the GST/HST tax credit for the period 2019-2020;
(g) changing the delivery of Climate Action Incentive payments from a refundable credit claimed annually to a credit that is paid quarterly;
(h) temporarily extending the period for incurring eligible expenses and other deadlines under film or video production tax credits;
(i) providing a tax incentive for specified zero-emission technology manufacturing activities;
(j) providing the Canada Revenue Agency (CRA) the discretion to accept late applications for the Canada Emergency Wage Subsidy, the Canada Emergency Rent Subsidy and the Canada Recovery Hiring Program;
(k) including postdoctoral fellowship income in the definition of “earned income” for RRSP purposes;
(l) enabling registered charities to enter into charitable partnerships with organizations other than qualified donees under certain conditions;
(m) allowing automatic and immediate revocation of the registration of an organization as a charity where that organization is listed as a terrorist entity under the Criminal Code ;
(n) enabling the CRA to use taxpayer information to assist in the collection of Canada Emergency Business Account loans; and
(o) expanding capital cost allowance deductions to include new clean energy equipment.
It also makes related and consequential amendments to the Excise Tax Act , the Children’s Special Allowances Act , the Excise Act, 2001 , the Income Tax Regulations and the Children’s Special Allowance Regulations .
Part 2 implements certain Goods and Services Tax/Harmonized Sales Tax (GST/HST) measures by
(a) ensuring that all assignment sales in respect of newly constructed or substantially renovated residential housing are taxable supplies for GST/HST purposes; and
(b) extending eligibility for the expanded hospital rebate to health care services supplied by charities or non-profit organizations with the active involvement of, or on the recommendation of, either a physician or a nurse practitioner, irrespective of their geographic location.
Part 3 amends the Excise Act, 2001 , the Excise Act and other related texts in order to implement three measures.
Division 1 of Part 3 implements a new federal excise duty framework for vaping products by, among other things,
(a) requiring that manufacturers of vaping products obtain a vaping licence from the CRA;
(b) requiring that all vaping products that are removed from the premises of a vaping licensee to be entered into the Canadian market for retail sale be affixed with an excise stamp;
(c) imposing excise duties on vaping products to be paid by vaping product licensees;
(d) providing for administration and enforcement rules related to the excise duty framework on vaping products;
(e) providing the Governor in Council with authority to provide for an additional excise duty in respect of provinces and territories that enter into a coordinated vaping product taxation agreement with Canada; and
(f) making related amendments to other legislative texts, including to allow for a coordinated federal/provincial-territorial vaping product taxation system and to ensure that the excise duty framework applies properly to imported vaping products.
Division 2 of Part 3 amends the excise duty exemption under the Excise Act, 2001 for wine produced in Canada and composed wholly of agricultural or plant product grown in Canada.
Division 3 of Part 3 amends the Excise Act to eliminate excise duty for beer containing no more than 0.5% alcohol by volume.
Part 4 enacts the Select Luxury Items Tax Act . That Act creates a new taxation regime for domestic sales, and importations into Canada, of certain new motor vehicles and aircraft priced over $100,000 and certain new boats priced over $250,000. It provides that the tax applies if the total price or value of the subject select luxury item at the time of sale or importation exceeds the relevant price threshold. It provides that the tax is to be calculated at the lesser of 10% of the total price of the item and 20% of the total price of the item that exceeds the relevant price threshold. To promote compliance with the new taxation regime, that Act includes modern elements of administration and enforcement aligned with those found in other taxation statutes. Finally, this Part also makes related and consequential amendments to other texts to ensure proper implementation of the new tax and to ensure a cohesive and efficient administration by the CRA.
Division 1 of Part 5 retroactively renders a provision of the contract that is set out in the schedule to An Act respecting the Canadian Pacific Railway , chapter 1 of the Statutes of Canada, 1881, to be of no force or effect. It retroactively extinguishes any obligations and liabilities of Her Majesty in right of Canada and any rights and privileges of the Canadian Pacific Railway Company arising out of or acquired under that provision.
Division 2 of Part 5 amends the Nisga’a Final Agreement Act to give force of law to the entire Nisga’a Nation Taxation Agreement during the period that that Taxation Agreement is, by its terms, in force.
Division 3 of Part 5 repeals the Safe Drinking Water for First Nations Act .
It also amends the Income Tax Act to exempt from taxation under that Act any income earned by the Safe Drinking Water Trust in accordance with the Settlement Agreement entered into on September 15, 2021 relating to long-term drinking water quality for impacted First Nations.
Division 4 of Part 5 authorizes payments to be made out of the Consolidated Revenue Fund for the purpose of addressing transit shortfalls and needs and improving housing supply and affordability.
Division 5 of Part 5 amends the Canada Deposit Insurance Corporation Act by adding the President and Chief Executive Officer of the Canada Deposit Insurance Corporation and one other member to that Corporation’s Board of Directors.
Division 6 of Part 5 amends the Federal-Provincial Fiscal Arrangements Act to authorize additional payments to the provinces and territories.
Division 7 of Part 5 amends the Borrowing Authority Act to, among other things, count previously excluded borrowings made in the spring of 2021 in the calculation of the maximum amount that may be borrowed. It also amends the Financial Administration Act to change certain reporting requirements in relation to amounts borrowed under orders made under paragraph 46.1(c) of that Act.
Division 8 of Part 5 amends the Pension Benefits Standards Act, 1985 to, among other things, permit the establishment of a solvency reserve account in the pension fund of certain defined benefit plans and require the establishment of governance policies for all pension plans.
Division 9 of Part 5 amends the Special Import Measures Act to, among other things,
(a) provide that assessments of injury are to take into account impacts on workers;
(b) require the Canadian International Trade Tribunal to make inquiries with respect to massive importations when it is acting under section 42 of that Act;
(c) require that Tribunal to initiate expiry reviews of certain orders and findings;
(d) modify the deadline for notifying the government of the country of export of properly documented complaints;
(e) modify the criteria for imposing duties in cases of massive importations;
(f) modify the criteria for initiating anti-circumvention investigations; and
(g) remove the requirement that, in order to find circumvention, the principal cause of the change in a pattern of trade must be the imposition of anti-dumping or countervailing duties.
It also amends the Canadian International Trade Tribunal Act to provide that trade unions may, with the support of domestic producers, file global safeguard complaints.
Division 10 of Part 5 amends the Trust and Loan Companies Act and the Insurance Companies Act to, among other things, modernize corporate governance communications of financial institutions.
Division 11 of Part 5 amends the Insurance Companies Act to permit property and casualty companies and marine companies to not include the value of certain debt obligations when calculating their borrowing limit.
Division 12 of Part 5 enacts the Prohibition on the Purchase of Residential Property by Non-Canadians Act . The Act prohibits the purchase of residential property in Canada by non-Canadians unless they are exempted by the Act or its regulations or the purchase is made in certain circumstances specified in the regulations.
Division 13 of Part 5 amends the Parliament of Canada Act and makes consequential and related amendments to other Acts to, among other things,
(a) change the additional annual allowances that are paid to senators who occupy certain positions so that the government’s representatives and the Opposition in the Senate are eligible for the allowances for five positions each and the three other recognized parties or parliamentary groups in the Senate with the greatest number of members are eligible for the allowances for four positions each;
(b) provide that the Leader of the Government in the Senate or Government Representative in the Senate, the Leader of the Opposition in the Senate and the Leader or Facilitator of every other recognized party or parliamentary group in the Senate are to be consulted on the appointment of certain officers and agents of Parliament; and
(c) provide that the Leader of the Government in the Senate or Government Representative in the Senate, the Leader of the Opposition in the Senate and the Leader or Facilitator of every other recognized party or parliamentary group in the Senate may change the membership of the Standing Senate Committee on Internal Economy, Budgets and Administration.
Division 14 of Part 5 amends the Financial Administration Act in order to, among other things, allow the Treasury Board to provide certain services to certain entities.
Division 15 of Part 5 amends the Competition Act to enhance the Commissioner of Competition’s investigative powers, criminalize wage fixing and related agreements, increase maximum fines and administrative monetary penalties, clarify that incomplete price disclosure is a false or misleading representation, expand the definition of anti-competitive conduct, allow private access to the Competition Tribunal to remedy an abuse of dominance and improve the effectiveness of the merger notification requirements and other provisions.
Division 16 of Part 5 amends the Copyright Act to extend certain terms of copyright protection, including the general term, from 50 to 70 years after the life of the author and, in doing so, implements one of Canada’s obligations under the Canada–United States–Mexico Agreement.
Division 17 of Part 5 amends the College of Patent Agents and Trademark Agents Act to, among other things,
(a) ensure that the College has sufficient independence and flexibility to exercise its corporate functions;
(b) provide statutory immunity to certain persons involved in the regulatory activities of the College; and
(c) grant powers to the Registrar and Investigations Committee that will allow for improved efficiency in the complaints and discipline process.
Division 18 of Part 5 enacts the Civil Lunar Gateway Agreement Implementation Act to implement Canada’s obligations under the Memorandum of Understanding between the Government of Canada and the Government of the United States of America concerning Cooperation on the Civil Lunar Gateway. It provides for powers to protect confidential information provided under the Memorandum. It also makes related amendments to the Criminal Code to extend its application to activities related to the Lunar Gateway and to the Government Employees Compensation Act to address the cross-waiver of liability set out in the Memorandum.
Division 19 of Part 5 amends the Corrections and Conditional Release Act to restrict the use of detention in dry cells to cases where the institutional head has reasonable grounds to believe that an inmate has ingested contraband or that contraband is being carried in the inmate’s rectum.
Division 20 of Part 5 amends the Customs Act in order to authorize its administration and enforcement by electronic means and to provide that the importer of record of goods is jointly and severally, or solidarily, liable to pay duties on the goods under section 17 of that Act with the importer or person authorized to account for the goods, as the case may be, and the owner of the goods.
Division 21 of Part 5 amends the Criminal Code to create an offence of wilfully promoting antisemitism by condoning, denying or downplaying the Holocaust through statements communicated other than in private conversation.
Division 22 of Part 5 amends the Judges Act , the Federal Courts Act , the Tax Court of Canada Act and certain other acts to, among other things,
(a) implement the Government of Canada’s response to the report of the sixth Judicial Compensation and Benefits Commission regarding salaries and benefits and to create the office of supernumerary prothonotary of the Federal Court;
(b) increase the number of judges for certain superior courts and include the new offices of Associate Chief Justice of the Court of Queen’s Bench of New Brunswick and Associate Chief Justice of the Court of Queen’s Bench for Saskatchewan;
(c) create the offices of prothonotary and supernumerary prothonotary of the Tax Court of Canada; and
(d) replace the term “prothonotary” with “associate judge”.
Division 23 of Part 5 amends the Immigration and Refugee Protection Act to, among other things,
(a) authorize the Minister of Citizenship and Immigration to give instructions establishing categories of foreign nationals for the purposes of determining to whom an invitation to make an application for permanent residence is to be issued, as well as instructions setting out the economic goal that that Minister seeks to support in establishing the category;
(b) prevent an officer from issuing a visa or other document to a foreign national invited in respect of an established category if the foreign national is not in fact eligible to be a member of that category;
(c) require that the annual report to Parliament on the operation of that Act include a description of any instructions that establish a category of foreign nationals, the economic goal sought to be supported in establishing the category and the number of foreign nationals invited to make an application for permanent residence in respect of the category; and
(d) authorize that Minister to give instructions respecting the class of permanent residents in respect of which a foreign national must apply after being issued an invitation, if the foreign national is eligible to be a member of more than one class.
Division 24 of Part 5 amends the Old Age Security Act to correct a cross-reference in that Act to the Budget Implementation Act, 2021, No. 1 .
Division 25 of Part 5
(a) amends the Canada Emergency Response Benefit Act to set out the consequences that apply in respect of a worker who received, for a four-week period, an income support payment and who received, for any week during the four-week period, any benefit, allowance or money referred to in subparagraph 6(1)(b)(ii) or (iii) of that Act;
(b) amends the Canada Emergency Student Benefit Act to set out the consequences that apply in respect of a student who received, for a four-week period, a Canada emergency student benefit and who received, for any week during the four-week period, any benefit, allowance or money referred to in subparagraph 6(1)(b)(ii) or (iii) of that Act; and
(c) amends the Employment Insurance Act to set out the consequences that apply in respect of a claimant who received, for any week, an employment insurance emergency response benefit and who received, for that week, any payment or benefit referred to in paragraph 153.9(2)(c) or (d) of that Act.
Division 26 of Part 5 amends the Employment Insurance Act to, among other things,
(a) replace employment benefits and support measures set out in Part II of that Act with employment support measures that are intended to help insured participants and other workers — including workers in groups underrepresented in the labour market — to obtain and keep employment; and
(b) allow the Canada Employment Insurance Commission to enter into agreements to provide for the payment of contributions to organizations for the costs of measures that they implement and that are consistent with the purpose and guidelines set out in Part II of that Act.
It also makes a consequential amendment to the Income Tax Act .
Division 27 of Part 5 amends the Employment Insurance Act to specify the maximum number of weeks for which benefits may be paid in a benefit period to certain seasonal workers and to extend, until October 28, 2023, the increase in the maximum number of weeks for which those benefits may be paid. It also amends the Budget Implementation Act, 2021, No. 1 to add a transitional measure in relation to amendments to the Employment Insurance Regulations that are found in that Act.
Division 28 of Part 5 amends the Canada Pension Plan to make corrections respecting
(a) the calculation of the minimum qualifying period and the contributory period for the purposes of the post-retirement disability benefit;
(b) the determination of values for contributors who have periods excluded from their contributory periods by reason of disability; and
(c) the attribution of amounts for contributors who have periods excluded from their contributory periods because they were family allowance recipients.
Division 29 of Part 5 amends An Act to amend the Criminal Code and the Canada Labour Code to, among other things,
(a) shorten the period before which an employee begins to earn one day of medical leave of absence with pay per month;
(b) standardize the conditions related to the requirement to provide a medical certificate following a medical leave of absence, regardless of whether the leave is paid or unpaid;
(c) authorize the Governor in Council to make regulations in certain circumstances, including to modify certain provisions respecting medical leave of absence with pay;
(d) ensure that, for the purposes of medical leave of absence, an employee who changes employers due to the lease or transfer of a work, undertaking or business or due to a contract being awarded through a retendering process is deemed to be continuously employed with one employer; and
(e) provide that the provisions relating to medical leave of absence come into force no later than December 1, 2022.
Division 30 of Part 5 amends the Canada Business Corporations Act to, among other things,
(a) require certain corporations to send to the Director appointed under that Act information on individuals with significant control on an annual basis or when a change occurs;
(b) allow that Director to provide all or part of that information to an investigative body, the Financial Transactions and Reports Analysis Centre of Canada or any prescribed entity; and
(c) clarify that, for the purposes of subsection 21.1(7) of that Act, it is the securities of a corporation, not the corporation itself, that are listed and posted for trading on a designated stock exchange.
Division 31 of Part 5 amends the Special Economic Measures Act and the Justice for Victims of Corrupt Foreign Officials Act (Sergei Magnitsky Law) to, among other things,
(a) create regimes allowing for the forfeiture of property that has been seized or restrained under those Acts;
(b) specify that the proceeds resulting from the disposition of those properties are to be used for certain purposes; and
(c) allow for the sharing of information between certain persons in certain circumstances.
It also makes amendments to the Seized Property Management Act in relation to those forfeiture of property regimes.

Motions in amendment

[Kevin Lamoureux, Liberal, Parliamentary Secretary to the Leader of the Government in the House of Commons]

Madam Speaker, as members well know, a great deal of consultation takes place in the presentation of any budget and in putting together budgetary implementation legislation. It is a process that, in essence, involves many stakeholders and thousands of Canadians. I do appreciate the member raising the issue, and people who follow the budget debate will hopefully understand and appreciate the degree to which governments, particularly the ministry of finance, reach into communities.

The member talked a great deal about the luxury tax. I understand that members of the NDP, in principle, support a luxury tax, but is there something specific that they would like to see modified, other than just an implementation delay?

[Daniel Blaikie, NDP, Elmwood—Transcona, MB]

Madam Speaker, I would encourage the member to listen to the industry, including the machinists who represent many workers in that industry. They have said the issue is not the principle of the tax, although I am sure there are some in the industry who dispute the principle, but that it is more the structure of the tax, and particularly the way it requires manufacturers to pay the amount of that tax up front That is one of the issues that we have heard them talk about—

[The Assistant Deputy Speaker (Mrs. Alexandra Mendès), Alexandra Mendes]

Order. The hon. member for Joliette is rising on a point of order to point out a problem with interpretation.

Is interpretation working now? Yes, it is.

The hon. member for Elmwood—Transcona.

[Daniel Blaikie, NDP, Elmwood—Transcona, MB]

Madam Speaker, on the other issue, consultation, I would say that the incredible amount of improvement that happened to the bill is also a testament to the lack of appropriate consultation that went into preparing the budget bill. I think that was not more evident than in the case of the employment insurance appeal board. In that case, I think the very people who the government sought to please with the reforms were the people who were most upset.

I think it is a testament to the fact that the government has to do a lot better job in consulting people when it is preparing the budget bill so that it does not have to be fixed in the way this particular bill needed to be fixed. I am glad that the composition of this Parliament and this committee allowed it to be fixed, instead of having a majority government ploughing ahead with some ill-conceived reforms.

[Kelly McCauley, Conservative, Edmonton West, AB]

Madam Speaker, I quite enjoyed the two years the member and I worked together on the operations committee. Although his replacements, the member from Hamilton Centre and then the member from Port Alberni, are doing wonderful jobs, he is welcome back at any time.

He spoke about the issue of the disability credit, the difficulties Canadians are having in applying for it and some of the silliness of the regulations. The Auditor General just released a somewhat damning report on the government about the inability and difficulty that lower-income and marginalized Canadians are having in accessing benefits, such as the GIS and other Canadian benefits.

Does the member believe that the government should get on this and perhaps present legislation to help Canadians with these issues as well as the other disability tax credit he spoke about?

[Daniel Blaikie, NDP, Elmwood—Transcona, MB]

Madam Speaker, the short answer is yes.

I think the member is aware of these issues, but for those who may not be, the inadequacies of the disability tax credit structure touch on so many more things. I will give a couple of quick examples.

In the pandemic, when the NDP fought for a one-time payment for people living with disabilities, the government initially wanted to use the disability tax credit list as its go-to list for people who would get it. However, it is actually quite difficult to qualify for the DTC, the disability tax credit. It involves a lot of costs and a lot of time and a lot of administrative knowledge in order to get all of the pieces in place to get on that list. It is only worth it to someone who already makes enough money to benefit from a tax credit, so the people who need financial support the most tend not to be on the DTC roll. However, that is a gate control for the government for many programs that support people living with disabilities.

It is a major problem, not just with the DTC but within the entire disability support infrastructure. An irony of that was that when we initially presented the amendment to exempt people with type 1 diabetes from the 14-hour requirement, the ruling by the chair was that because the DTC is a gate for other disability programs, there would be more spending if it was easier to get the DTC, so parliamentarians were not going to be able to change it.

[Gabriel Ste-Marie, Bloc, Joliette, QC]

Madam Speaker, I thank my colleague for that great speech and his excellent work in committee. I do have a question about amendments to the luxury tax. He made a reference to David Chartrand, the machinists' and aerospace workers' representative who came and asked us to support the amendments I proposed. My colleague voted against those amendments. I was very surprised that my NDP colleague voted against amendments that unions asked for. I did not know what to make of that.

Did my colleague have to vote against because the NDP has an agreement to support the Liberal government?

[Daniel Blaikie, NDP, Elmwood—Transcona, MB]

Madam Speaker, I voted against because we did not think it was a good idea to try to rewrite complex tax code in the space of a few hours sitting around a table. We know doing it properly requires a lot more information. It also takes resources, and, given that the government has those resources, we want it to do the work to fix the tax.

That is why I voted against those amendments.

[Kevin Lamoureux, Liberal, Parliamentary Secretary to the Leader of the Government in the House of Commons]

Madam Speaker, it is always a pleasure to talk about the budget of Canada. There is so much that one can talk about. How do we limit all the good news we have been able to put into the budget, not only in this budget but in previous budgets, starting in 2015 when we were first elected? There is so much substance and there are so many things we have been able to accomplish in a relatively short period of time.

Having said that, I thought I would reflect on some of the comments made by the shadow minister of finance, the new one. We can recall that the previous one was unceremoniously replaced for some odd reason, and I will let the Conservatives deal with that replacement.

The member for Central Okanagan—Similkameen—Nicola said that the Liberal government has a spending problem, implying that Liberals tend to like spending money. I can honestly say that we do understand the importance of the government's role in making our communities healthier. We understand that.

However, I want to remind my Conservative friends across the way that it was not that long ago that we had a national election, and in that election campaign, there were a couple of economic matters that come to mind. One was that the Conservative Party of Canada, the same party across the way that just said we had a spending problem, committed to spend more money than the Liberal government. Conservatives are saying Liberals have a spending problem and that we are spending too much money, yet in the last federal election, they committed to spend more money. In fairness, they dumped their leader not that long ago. The leader of the Conservative Party at the time who made that commitment is no longer leader, so I have to be fair.

Then there is the debt. In that same election platform, the Conservative Party committed to a $168-billion debt. Our debt is actually less than that. Again we have what the Conservative Party said during the election campaign and what it says when it is the official opposition. Given the nature of what we are witnessing, such as the member for Carleton attacking the Bank of Canada and trying to set economic policy to the hard right, along with other individuals, I suspect there is a good chance that the Conservative Party will continue to be in opposition for many years ahead. Conservatives need to understand that spending, as the former leader of the Conservative Party said, is not all that bad.

Let me give an example. Yes, we came up with a national program that will enable Canadians to enter the workforce. It will provide all sorts of opportunities. It is our national child care program. Yes, it did cost a lot of money, but from coast to coast to coast, for the first time, we have a national child care program, a program that is supported by all of the provincial governments. Even the recently re-elected Doug Ford supported the child care program.

I suspect that if we were to canvass the House, we would find that only one political party does not recognize the value of having $10-a-day day care. We are talking about the conservative right in the Conservative Party of Canada, and there are a lot of them opposite, individuals who maybe dream of the days of the Reform Party. Who knows? Maybe we will see a resurfacing of the Reform right. It is a party that does not support the national child care program.

What does a national child care program do by making things affordable for Canadians? Not only does it help them during a difficult time, such as inflation, but it also provides them with the opportunity to do more work in our communities. If we look at what happened, we see that the province of Quebec led the country in showing that enabling the public to have better access through affordable child care would cause the workforce to grow. We only need to look at the province of Quebec to see how successful it was.

We have a national government. Much like when we had health care in one province many years ago, and then a national Liberal government made a national health care program with a Canada Health Act that followed, we now have a national child care program that comes out of the province of Quebec. That is going to allow hundreds of thousands of people the independence to get into the workforce if they choose to do so. That will generate more revenue for the government. It will provide more productivity for the nation and add to our GDP.

I would argue contrary to what the critic for finance said, or the shadow minister, as they like to be referred to. It will add value in many different ways. I would suggest that the member try to convince his caucus colleagues to get behind the child care plan that the Liberals, New Democrats, and even the Bloc and the Green Party are supporting. I suspect there are a few Conservatives who will ultimately support that plan, particularly those from the province of Quebec who might be a bit more progressive.

The NDP talked about the importance of consultation, and the finance critic made reference to the Deputy Prime Minister. I took it as a compliment when the member said that she has so many responsibilities. I agree; she is an incredible woman. She is Canada's very first female Minister of Finance and she is also the Deputy Prime Minister. She also plays a critical role in what is happening in Europe today.

She was just with me and my colleagues from Winnipeg South, Saint Boniface—Saint Vital and Winnipeg South Centre in the city of Winnipeg, welcoming over 300 displaced people from Ukraine. She is an incredible woman who has done Canada proud in terms of where she has put us in moving us forward, especially in comparison to other countries around the world, particularly the United States.

When we compare our job numbers or our inflation rates to those of the United States or many of the European Union countries, we find that Canada rises to the top. It is because we believe in supporting, in a real and tangible way, Canada's middle class, those aspiring to be a part of it and Canadians in general who need a helping hand.

We can see that in the budgets we have presented, from day one up to the most recent budget. That is why I would encourage every member of this House to get behind the budget implementation bill and support it, instead of trying to come up with ways to block it. It is because this budget implementation bill will have a positive impact on everyone in Canada from coast to coast to coast. This is a budget bill that we can all be proud of, because it is a reflection of what Canadians want based on the consultations that were done by members of this government.

[Dan Albas, Conservative, Central Okanagan—Similkameen—Nicola, BC]

Madam Speaker, wow, there is so much to unpack there. This member has supported the government through thick and thin. We all need our loyal soldiers, but by the same token, let us just take a look at a few things.

First of all, under the current Prime Minister, there has been more debt added to our national debt than under any prime minister alive. This member continues to follow the “always be spending” ways of the Prime Minister. In fact, when he talks about child care, this member continues to mistake leadership with cutting cheques. In British Columbia, one of the first provinces to adopt this new national program of theirs, we still do not have $10-a-day day care, and the government cannot actually say when it is going to do it. It might take years. The member keeps conflating action with spending.

This is something the former finance minister said: “there’s no real sense of urgency in Ottawa, about our lack of competitiveness. It’s like we’re the proverbial frog in the pot and not realizing what’s happening to us as the heat gradually increases”.

When will the frog get out of the pot?

[Kevin Lamoureux, Liberal, Winnipeg North, MB]

Madam Speaker, the member needs to be a little more straightforward with what reality actually is.

The member made reference to the Prime Minister and the debt. There is a little thing called the worldwide pandemic. That event was something that cost a considerable amount of money. Many of the billions of dollars that were spent were actually supported in part by the Conservative Party. That is the reason why.

If we are going to support Canadians, if we are going to invest in and support nine million Canadians through the CERB program and keep tens of thousands of businesses from going bankrupt by supporting them through rent subsidies and wage subsidies, that costs money. We would argue that those sorts of expenditures are what has enabled Canada to continue.

[Gabriel Ste-Marie, Bloc, Joliette, QC]

Madam Speaker, my colleague mentioned earlier how much consultation the government has done, especially on Bill C-19.

Yes, I would agree that consultation was fairly extensive. The problem, however, is that the general consensuses that came out of those consultations are not reflected in the bill, as if there had been no consultation. For instance, the section on employment insurance was removed. The same should have been done for the luxury tax and several other aspects, such as the Competition Act.

When will the government start actually paying attention to consultations and ensure that they are reflected in budget implementation bills?

[Kevin Lamoureux, Liberal, Winnipeg North, MB]

Madam Speaker, in all budget presentations and budget implementation bills, there is extensive consultation done. This particular Minister of Finance and the department have done exceptional work in terms of reaching out to Canadians and stakeholders to get their input. This is a budget that reflects the desires and the will of the Canadian people from coast to coast to coast.

[The Assistant Deputy Speaker (Mrs. Alexandra Mendès), Alexandra Mendes]

The hon. member will have two minutes left for questions next time the bill comes forward for debate.

The House resumed from June 3 consideration of Bill C-19, An Act to implement certain provisions of the budget tabled in Parliament on April 7, 2022 and other measures, as reported (with amendments) from the committee, and of the motions in Group No. 1.