Thank you very much.
I wanted to provide a few thoughts for the record. This is something that I'm generally supportive of. We've heard some reasons why the ban may not be quite as complete as one might think on a first read, including the fact that it invokes the definition proposed in the underused housing tax act. Folks who have been following the meeting will know I've been supporting the elements of that tax on clause-by-clause. I've been doing that because it's a step in the right direction, even though I think that the tax is not, ultimately, going to be adequate to the task, partly because I think there are a lot of loopholes and some of those have to do with this very definition. This is another step in the right direction.
There's no one silver bullet that's going to cure the problems of the housing market, but there has been a lot of talk about the role of foreign buyers in the Canadian housing market. This would at least create a window to see a relatively light definition of what a “foreign purchase” would be, given that we're using the definition in the act. It would give us an opportunity to see if putting a hold on some of the activity has a meaningful effect on prices in the housing market. As it has been said in many ways by many folks on all sides of the aisle, this is something that there is support for in principle.
I have to say that one of my frustrations over the last six and a half years has been the slow pace at which the Liberal government undertakes to meet its own commitments. I am pretty committed to trying to push for swifter action on certain things. We need to move on some things to get information on what policies are going to work and what aren't.
I'm prepared to move ahead with this amendment today, because it's a push in the right direction that the government clearly needs in order to get moving on some of its own stated commitments. If folks on the government side think that it needs to be done in another way, I would urge them to look at this and other platform commitments on housing, like banning blind bidding and other things, that they've talked about but they haven't moved on. If they think they know how to move on these things better.... As Mr. Albas just said, they control the timing on all of these things, so these are things for them to prepare and then to bring to Parliament in a more timely way. Where the government doesn't, it's appropriate for parliamentarians to push. This is an example of that kind of appropriate pushing, and it's why I'm happy to support this one.
It's a slightly different situation than in the case of Monsieur Ste-Marie's amendment, when I was happy to support his ability to motivate that amendment and to have a debate on it, although I had some concerns about the substance of that amendment and would not have been voting in favour of it today. I was happy to sustain the challenge.
I see Monsieur Ste-Marie. In this case, the shoe is on the other foot, but perhaps the debate around this amendment will have convinced him to support it after all.