Bill C-8

Economic and Fiscal Update Implementation Act, 2021

An Act to implement certain provisions of the economic and fiscal update tabled in Parliament on December 14, 2021 and other measures

Part 1 amends the Income Tax Act and the Income Tax Regulations in order to
(a) introduce a new refundable tax credit for eligible businesses on qualifying ventilation expenses made to improve air quality;
(b) expand the travel component of the northern residents deduction by giving all northern residents the option to claim up to $1,200 in eligible travel expenses even if the individual has not received travel assistance from their employer;
(c) expand the School Supplies Tax Credit from 15% to 25% and expand the eligibility criteria to include electronic devices used by eligible educators; and
(d) introduce a new refundable tax credit to return fuel charge proceeds to farming businesses in backstop jurisdictions.
Part 2 enacts the Underused Housing Tax Act . This Act implements an annual tax of 1% on the value of vacant or underused residential property directly or indirectly owned by non-resident non-Canadians. It sets out rules for the purpose of establishing owners’ liability for the tax. It also sets out applicable reporting and filing requirements. Finally, to promote compliance with its provisions, this Act includes modern administration and enforcement provisions aligned with those found in other taxation statutes.
Part 3 provides for a six-year limitation or prescription period for the recovery of amounts owing with respect to a loan provided under the Canada Emergency Business Account program established by Export Development Canada.
Part 4 authorizes payments to be made out of the Consolidated Revenue Fund for the purpose of supporting ventilation improvement projects in schools.
Part 5 authorizes payments to be made out of the Consolidated Revenue Fund for the purpose of supporting coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) proof-of-vaccination initiatives.
Part 6 authorizes the Minister of Health to make payments of up to $1.72 billion out of the Consolidated Revenue Fund in relation to coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) tests. It also sets out reporting requirements for the Minister of Health.
Part 7 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.

Economic and Fiscal Update Implementation Act, 2021

[Julie Vignola, Bloc, Beauport—Limoilou, QC]

Madam Speaker, inflation does not happen overnight.

It is a slow process that generally occurs over 12 to 18 months when there is a crisis like the one we are in. It can also take 12 to 18 months for deflation to return things to normal, and there are ways to get there.

I would like my colleague to talk about his suggestions for how to bring about deflation, which would let Canadians and Quebeckers better live within their budgets.

[Scott Aitchison, Conservative, Parry Sound—Muskoka, ON]

Madam Speaker, I think the first step in all of this is to get the outrageous spending under control. I completely agree with my colleague that it will take time. There is no real quick answer to this. However, it starts with stopping the borrowing, getting the spending under control, spending smarter and investing in the areas where it makes most sense. We need more housing supply, for example. We need to stop funding programs that give people money to try to get into a market that they cannot get into. They are not working. It will take time, but it starts with stopping the spending.

[Dave Epp, Conservative, Chatham-Kent—Leamington, ON]

Madam Speaker, my colleague referenced affordable housing and the lack thereof in his home riding. Certainly it is an issue in Chatham-Kent—Leamington as well. We are not a large metropolitan area. It is a mix of rural and small cities and towns.

He just touched on this in his answer to my Bloc colleague. Do the basic laws of supply and demand continue to hold true in the housing market? We have huge demand. Would it not be better, rather than adding another small tax that is not going to make a difference, to look at the barriers to supply? Could he comment?

[Scott Aitchison, Conservative, Parry Sound—Muskoka, ON]

Madam Speaker, the simple answer to my colleague's question is yes. As the former mayor of a small town, I can tell members right now that despite taxes on property, there is not enough room to fund all the responsibilities that municipalities already have. They take care of two-thirds of the transportation infrastructure in this country, and they do not have the tax revenue to actually fund the maintenance of it. However, we are hearing musings about the government looking at ways to tax things over a million dollars, which is barely an entry home in Toronto, because its members think they can dig a little more and find more tax revenue to spend. It is just not there.

Frankly, the simple answer to the question is that we need more supply and we need to stop the incredible pressures of foreign investors buying up properties so that we can actually make things more accessible for everyday Canadians.

[Kelly McCauley, Conservative, Edmonton West, AB]

Madam Speaker, my youngest son was born in the riding of my colleague for Parry Sound—Muskoka many years ago, and I always have fond memories of living there.

I am very pleased to join the debate on Bill C-8 today. Technically, it is called “An Act to implement certain provisions of the economic and fiscal update”, but it is also known as, “what is another $7 billion between friends or between the government and taxpayers' wallets”.

I am opposed to this bill, not necessarily item by item and bit by bit of the bill, but opposed to the out-of-control spending of the Liberals. It is part of the fiscal update the government introduced in December, which adds $71 billion of new spending: $71 billion of new debt, even before the Liberals' election promises are counted in.

As my colleague mentioned, the government has also put aside $100 billion in added stimulus. The PBO said that the government has reached its fiscal guardrails. It does not need to add that extra spending, yet here we have the government barrelling ahead. That $71 billion in new inflation spending is $71 billion that eventually will have to be paid back.

I want to put into perspective how much $71 billion is. The government brings in about $32 billion to $35 billion a year in GST. Just to cover the new spending the government added from its fiscal update in December, which covers Bill C-8, GST would have to go up to 16%. For Bill C-8 alone, all the GST in the country collected for three entire months would support just this small bit the government is adding, at 16%. Here in Ontario, HST would have to go to 24% just to cover this new Liberal spending, and in Saskatchewan it would go to 22%. In Alberta, we do not have the sales tax, thanks very much, but it still would be 16% GST just to cover this added spending.

My colleagues with the Conservative Party, the Bloc and the NDP, actually agree on something, and that is that the government should be increasing health care transfers to the provinces. According to the Public Accounts, there were something like $42 billion in health care transfers last year. The government could increase health care transfers 58% just with this new spending. It could increase health care transfers to the provinces by 16% just with the money spent in Bill C-8.

Regarding income taxes, we are already among the highest-taxed populations in the developed world. Income taxes would have to go up 41% just to cover the new Liberal spending from December. What could we do with that $71 billion instead? The government could actually fund 75 WE Charity scandals with that money.

We found that the government is great friends with SNC-Lavalin. The government gave the company $150 million for field hospitals. We asked the public works officials, and the public works minister, who asked for these. They did not know. The provinces did not ask for these hospitals. Public health did not ask for these hospitals. Public works says that public works asked for them. When we ask who in public works asked for them, we are told that it was public works. Apparently, if we look at GEDS, which is the public employees directory, we will see someone, “Mr. Public Works”, because that person apparently asked for this $150-million, sole-sourced, urgent contract for the Liberals' friends at SNC-Lavalin. It was so urgent that the government sole-sourced it without going out to bids from other companies. By the way, none of those hospitals has actually been delivered or used. With this $71 billion, the government could buy 4,700 added hospitals from its friends at SNC-Lavalin.

According to the Public Accounts that just came out, which, by the way, are the latest Public Accounts to have been delivered in about four decades, the interest-bearing debt for Canadians has now reached an eye-watering $1.4 trillion. I am going to break that down a bit. That is $1,440,000 million in debt.

Now, to put it into numbers that perhaps the Liberals can understand, and for their billionaire friends, that is $1,440 billion in debt. I mentioned the Liberals' friends because in the public accounts, $91 million of taxpayers' money was spent last year to subsidize wealthy owners to buy Tesla vehicles. Taxpayers gave $91 million to Tesla so that wealthy Canadians could buy cars made outside of Canada. The wealthiest man in the world, Elon Musk, got $91 million in subsidies from the government. He owns about 17%, so maybe he gets about $16 million directly. He is a great entrepreneur, I love his tweets and he is hilarious, but he does not need subsidies from the government or from the taxpayers.

I want to put this in perspective so that people can understand the money. The City of Edmonton got $17 million from the government for the rapid housing initiative. In the paper today, there was talk about it. Of the $17 million from the federal government, $11 million will be for buying the old Forum Hotel by the Rexall Centre, where the Oilers used to play. It is $11 million from the government for housing for the homeless, and $91 million to Elon Musk so that wealthy people can afford a Tesla.

In Canada, if one tried to buy a Tesla on a five-year loan at maybe 4.9% or 5.9%, it would cost well over $1,000 a month. I am not sure how many Canadians trying valiantly to work into the middle class could afford $1,000 a month, or who deserves $5,000 from taxpayers so they can stuff Elon Musk's pockets.

Poverty in Edmonton under the Liberal government has gone up, according to the Library of Canada, by 58%, from the most recent StatsCan numbers. For those without housing, like the homeless in Edmonton, the numbers have gone up two-thirds. Nevertheless, former Liberal Amarjeet Sohi, who is the new mayor of Edmonton, a wonderful guy whom I quite enjoy, is cheering on the Liberals because he got $11 million for housing for the homeless. It was $91 million for Elon Musk and $11 million from the Liberal government for the City of Edmonton. It is a disgrace. The money should not be going to corporate welfare, but to people who need it.

Now, for the debt mentioned, the $1.4 trillion, the government says do not worry, as we have the lowest debt-to-GDP ratio in the G7. However, guess what? The government is using what is called net debt. There is about half a trillion dollars in the CPP and QPP set aside for future payouts. This is not the future 30 years down the road, but payouts tomorrow for anyone who is 65. The government is counting that money toward the federal debt when it is claiming that it has the lowest debt-to-GDP ratio in the G7. This is money for seniors, not money for the government to use, to cash in and to pay on the debt. If we take it away, we are fourth out of seven. Consider the top 29 developed countries in the OECD. If we take out the $500 billion that belongs to seniors, because it is not the government's money, nor the Liberals' money, and show the real debt, we are the 25th worst out of 29 countries in the developed world for debt-to-GDP ratio.

The government should stop misleading Canadians. The government should keep its hands off the money set aside for seniors and stop pretending that it will be able to access that money to pay for its out-of-control spending.

I want to wrap up by talking about the need for focused spending. We have the public accounts and we have been going through the money. There is a disgraceful amount of waste by the government. I mentioned the $91 million for Elon Musk. There is another $50 million to General Motors, Toyota and Nissan for electric vehicle rebates. There is also $50,000 that the government prioritized to give to a corporation to develop a new taste for an India pale ale.

The government asked where we would cut. I would cut corporate bailouts. I would also end the corporate welfare and focus money on Canadians where it is needed.

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

Madam Speaker, I suspect that if I were to go over the Public Accounts from the Stephen Harper era, I would find more than just one minister who spent $60 or $40 for a glass of orange juice. There are ample examples of Conservative waste during the Stephen Harper era. However, my question is in regards to Bill C-8.

Bill C-8 would have over $1 billion being spent for rapid tests. Does the Conservative Party not support rapid tests? For months and months, they were like jumping beans in this place, jumping around saying that they want rapid tests. However, we have rapid tests in the bill. It is an investment in rapid tests. Canadians want rapid tests. It is also about putting cleaner air in our schools. There are hundreds of millions being spent to support that to and continue to support people in Canada.

Whether it is rapid tests or cleaner air, why would the Conservative Party oppose it?

[Kelly McCauley, Conservative, Edmonton West, AB]

Madam Speaker, I would like to thank my associate for Winnipeg North. He is not my friend, as he is more of an associate.

We in the Conservative Party have been asking for these rapid tests for close to two years, yet now the government is finally saying, “Oh, we'll get around to it, but you better give us the money.” It is not an issue of just spend, spend, spend or we are going to take the rapid tests away. We want the rapid tests.

What I would suggest to this gentleman is that perhaps, instead of using the $20 billion to $30 billion in corporate welfare to pay off Air Canada, Lululemon, Bell, Telus, Rogers and their wealthy insiders with taxpayers' money, they should have spent that money on rapid tests two years ago.

[Sébastien Lemire, Bloc, Abitibi—Témiscamingue, QC]

Madam Speaker, I own an electric vehicle and I find these issues to be rather interesting. Clearly, I am not interested in funding Elon Musk. I am interested in owning an electric vehicle. The United States has developed a strategy to ensure that Americans can buy vehicles designed in the United States. That has repercussions for us.

How can we ensure that every Canadian and every Quebecker can have access to an electric vehicle? Should we not increase tax credits for the purchase of electric vehicles? Could this be good for Canada's economy? I wonder about that. I think that would be part of the solution and that it should have been included in the economic update.

[Kelly McCauley, Conservative, Edmonton West, AB]

Madam Speaker, we have a philosophical difference. I do not believe that we should use taxpayers' money to subsidize wealthy people. As members of Parliament, I think we are in the top 4% or 5% of income level in Canada, and we should not be subsidizing members of Parliament to buy electric cars, period.

[Arnold Viersen, Conservative, Peace River—Westlock, AB]

Madam Speaker, I want to thank the hon. member for his speech. On the topic of cars, I have given him a ride in my car. I do not know if he will ever come again after that, and it was definitely not electric.

I want to go a little more into this whole idea of subsidizing a car, which drives up inflation. I remember back when I was a kid, the government had a program for well drilling and immediately the price of wells doubled. I wonder if the hon. member can comment on that.

[Kelly McCauley, Conservative, Edmonton West, AB]

Madam Speaker, I want to thank my colleague for the question and for the rides from the airport. Yes, the more we subsidize it, the more it is just driving up the price. Demand will always expand to take up every free thing offered by the government.

Further to the gentleman from the Bloc's question, study after study shows that the actual return on investment and the reduction of GHG with electric cars is one of the very worst. If the government is going to subsidize something, let us subsidize upgrades to housing, windows, insulation and those items, but not subsidize the wealthy.

[The Assistant Deputy Speaker, Carol Hughes]

I will just take this moment to remind members that they do need to have the proper headset in order to participate. It is not that we do not want them to participate. I do not think that there is a reason for MPs not to have them. I have asked IT to reach out to the previous member as well. I would ask members to reach out to IT if they do not have headsets for wherever they are. I know that they can be purchased through the budgets as well.

That is just a reminder so that we can keep the flow going into the House of Commons, and everybody is able to have the interpretation that they rightly deserve.

Resuming debate, the hon. member for Battle River—Crowfoot.

I know we are having some technical issues, so I will go to the hon. member for Peace River—Westlock.

[Arnold Viersen, Conservative, Peace River—Westlock, AB]

Madam Speaker, it is an honour and a privilege to be confused with the hon. member for Battle River—Crowfoot, who is a great member from that part of the country. I am located a bit north of his riding. Nonetheless, I am happy to share the stage with him. He is a good friend of mine.

Today I am speaking about the fiscal update, Bill C-8. I think the title of this story is “inflation”. We have seen inflation run wild right across the country. I am an auto mechanic and come from the automotive world. I spent most of my life before this place working at a Chrysler dealership in northern Alberta and Abbotsford, B.C., so that is the world I know more significantly. I do not know about others, but I have been driving around Canada noticing that the parking lots of car dealerships are empty. Anyone who has a three-year-old vehicle can trade it in for the same amount of money it was bought for three years ago.

I talked to a fellow during the election campaign who had a 2019 Ford one-ton pickup. He uses it to pull his holiday trailer. The dealership called him to say that since he only uses his truck to pull his holiday trailer, would he consider trading in his 2019 truck in August for a 2022 pickup truck in April of 2022. The man was told the dealership would guarantee him a new truck in April of 2022 if it could have his truck that day with no increase in his payments or the money he owes. It would be a clean swap. He got a pickup that was three years newer. That is a picture inflation. That is a picture of supply chain shortages and life getting more expensive. The fact that pickup trucks are now more expensive today than they were three years ago shows that inflation is happening.

We see it all around us. Now we have major supply chain shortages that are causing some of this inflation, whether it is microchips not making it across the ocean from China to manufacturers or a problem with trucking, but it also has to do with the amount of cash that is being put into the economy in Canada. We are also noticing higher prices in grocery stores of things that we have always relied on. To some degree it is the success of capitalism; when people go to the store, the bread lines up for them. The things we have come to appreciate and take for granted in many cases are not necessarily there today. Because of shortages, we are seeing the prices go up.

Farmers are saying they are getting record prices for their products, but when they buy their inputs, their inputs have increased threefold. They are getting double for their products, but their inputs are threefold higher, so their margins are all in flux. They are not able to predict what they are going to be doing and, in many cases, it does not matter how much money they have, they just cannot get the product. It does not matter whether the product was priced at zero dollars or $100. If they cannot get it, they cannot get it. That is an increasing challenge in this new world.

The point of all of this is that we are driving inflation through flooding the country with cheap cash. Statistics Canada says inflation is currently running at nearly 5%. When people can get money at 2% or 3%, they are basically getting paid to take on debt and we are seeing massive amounts of household debt. People are using the equity in their homes to run their lives, and it is spurring on inflation across the country. All of these things contribute to inflation. Folks continually tell me their groceries have gone up twice the price from a year ago.

There are increased trucking costs associated with this. I spoke to a sawmill owner in Slave Lake, Alberta. Two years ago, it typically cost him $2,000 to get a B-train of lumber down to the coast; today it is costing him anywhere from $5,500 to $6,000. That is a threefold increase in the price of the trucking. The fuel cost is up 50%. A year ago it was hovering around a dollar; now it is running at about $1.50. All of these things are making our lives more expensive.

The other thing I heard from constituents around New Year's was that the December natural gas bill for most people in my riding was the highest bill they have ever had, and a big part of that is due to the carbon tax. Folks were complaining to me that the carbon tax portion of their bill was larger than the actual natural gas costs of the bill. There are the transmission fees and things like that on there, but the actual natural gas they pay for would have been about a third of the bill and then the carbon tax would be about a third of the bill.

That was extremely frustrating to many Canadians, given that they said they had already done everything to reduce their bill. They had upgraded their windows and they had put in more insulation into the ceiling and they had reduced the temperature in their house, all to try to reduce their bill, and yet they had the largest bill in their entire life in December 2021. Again, we are seeing inflation being driven by things like the carbon tax and government policy in this country. They were calling on me to alleviate the carbon tax on home heating or eliminate the carbon tax in its entirety.

The other thing I wanted to talk about is about what it is going to take to get the economy up and running again.

We are seeing the cost of labour going up significantly. There are plentiful jobs. During the election I stopped in at a restaurant, and it was not open. It was four o'clock in the afternoon, and they were not open, so a week later when I drove through, I stopped in again, earlier in the day. I had a chat with a waitress and I said I was there last week and they were not open. She said, “Oh, no; we close at four o'clock. We have not been able to get enough staff to stay open all day.” That is something I hear from people all across northern Alberta—that they cannot find enough people to fill the jobs.

Again, that is causing them to offer more pay to attract people to come, and that is also another thing that is driving inflation. Basically, if someone is getting paid more to do the same job but their life costs more on the other side, they have not gained anything. All that happens is that the dollar numbers are higher. That, essentially, is what inflation is. It is the devaluing of our money so that it takes more money to do the same thing, and that is happening in both directions. That is happening in the wages and also in the costs of everything.

We are not necessarily seeing massive increases in production. We are seeing bigger numbers all around, larger numbers, but we are not necessarily seeing the tonnes of coal go up significantly or the barrels of oil go up significantly. All we are seeing is the dollar numbers associated with that going up, and that is, in a nutshell, what inflation is. The government has the levers to make sure that our dollar is worth something in the world, that our lives are affordable and that when we work for our money, we are able to pay for the things we need in order to live our lives. This particular suite of policies the government is proposing would do nothing to alleviate inflation, and for that reason I will not be supporting this bill.

[John McKay, Liberal, Scarborough—Guildwood, ON]

Madam Speaker, the hon. member described the problem with excellence, but his allocation of fault may be a little faulty. I was wondering how the hon. member thinks that the Government of Canada has much to do with the supply of microchips to make cars go. I have made the same observation that he has. Car lots are empty.

Members should know that the hon. member is quite an outstanding mechanic, and had won several awards for his work prior to being an MP. However, I am not sure that his speech is actually such an outstanding description of the issues.

Could the member tell me what the Government of Canada has to do, for instance, with the issue of supplies, or input costs, or grain or other necessities? These are just issues that are worldwide, and we are the unhappy recipients of that reality.

[Arnold Viersen, Conservative, Peace River—Westlock, AB]

Madam Speaker, the basic issue that we are dealing with is that the government has pumped a huge amount of cash into the system, and that has inflated the prices that people are receiving for their goods. All that has happened, though, is that everybody has taken advantage of the increased prices that they are getting for their products. Then the folks on the bottom end are saying their costs are going up as well, so they have to increase their prices.

Basically, if my grain is sold for X dollars, and my fertilizer company sees that the farmer who was getting $10 a bushel last year is now getting $20 a bushel, it will probably increase the price of its product and still get paid for it, because it thinks that farmers are now flush with cash. That has a domino effect down the economy.

A host of government policies are driving the costs up in both directions.