House of Commons Hansard #353 of the 42nd Parliament, 1st Session. (The original version is on Parliament's site.) The word of the day was balanced.

Topics

Opposition Motion--FinanceBusiness of SupplyGovernment Orders

1:25 p.m.

Conservative

Luc Berthold Conservative Mégantic—L'Érable, QC

Madam Speaker, I will be sharing my time with my colleague from Saskatoon—Grasswood. I am sure he is also looking forward to hearing the government's response to the question raised in the motion moved by my colleague from Carleton that the House call on the government to tell Canadians in what year the budget will be balanced, and to do so in this week's fall economic statement.

It is a very simple and non-partisan motion that does not pass judgment on how this government has been spending Canadians' money. It makes no mention of any of the promises this government made, which I will talk about in my speech. Many promises were made around balancing the budget, but the motion makes absolutely no mention of that. It just asks one simple question to which all Canadians deserve an answer: when will the budget be balanced? What is so scary about answering that question?

One of my colleagues across the aisle delivered a long 20-minute speech, but he did not once address the matter before us today: when does the Liberal government plan to return to a balanced budget? Why is it so afraid of giving us a date for returning to a balanced budget? It is as though the government thinks that balancing the budget is something to be ashamed of.

With Wednesday's economic statement, Canadians are going to learn how this government has been spending taxpayers' money without any real plan to return to a balanced budget. It is no secret that the Liberals are spending money on the backs of future generations of Canadians.

The Department of Finance is not afraid to set a date, and it says the budget will not be balanced until 2045. By then, our national debt will have increased by nearly half a trillion dollars. That is an extra $450 billion that will be added to our debt if nothing is done now. I will be 79 before Canada returns to a balanced budget. Imagine that. Many Canadians who are not even born yet will be 20, 22 or 23. They will not learn at school how important it is to balance their budget, because their country will not be able to achieve a balanced budget. They will hear that throughout their entire education.

Let us not forget what the Liberals promised in 2015, during the last election campaign. They promised to run small deficits for three years and then return to a balanced budget in 2019. They wanted to reassure Canadians by telling them that they would run small deficits because the economy was doing well and interest rates were low and that they they would return to a balanced budget at the end of their term. They said that they would use that money to invest in infrastructure, which would create jobs for Canadians.

First, the money promised for infrastructure did not come, and second, the small deficits that were promised have ballooned massively. I am not tall enough to demonstrate how big the deficits have gotten.

We are in an excellent economic situation globally, and that generates revenues for the government that should have been more than enough for making investments. However, this government has decided to invest money it does not have, money from future generations, to keep itself going and fulfill its promises. In fact, there are a number of promises it has not kept, but I will come back to that.

Canadian families deserve a government that looks out for them and manages their finances more carefully. This year the deficit is close to $20 billion, three times more than what the Prime Minister had said, and the debt has gone up by $60 billion since 2015. Failing to fulfill their promises has now become the Liberals' trademark as they betray Canadians' trust yet again.

We knew that the Prime Minister had had training as an actor, but it seems he also thought he could be a fortune teller. When he announced small deficits, he made an astonishing statement about budgets balancing themselves. The budget would balance on its own. We can see that the Prime Minister does not really have much talent as a fortune teller. Not only will the budget not balance itself, but the deficit will be three times higher than what he had predicted. That is shameful.

The Prime Minister has no talent for fortune telling or for accounting, because he has never really had to worry about balancing his personal finances in his life. Our Prime Minister was born with a silver spoon in his mouth, as the saying goes. He never had to balance a personal budget. He never had to worry about having enough money left at the end of the month, about transferring the balance of one credit card to another so that he could put food on the table. He never had to do that. The Prime Minister was born into wealth, and he thinks that he can manage Canada the way he manages his own personal finances, by letting banks and others take care of Canadians' money. That is not the reality of Canadians. Canadians are increasingly worried. They are more and more concerned about the Liberal government's successive, never-ending deficits. A survey published in the Globe and Mail in October said that nearly 60% of Canadians think that balancing the budget should be the government's priority.

We are asking the Liberals to give us a date. When will the budget be balanced? When?

Not only are they incapable of balancing a budget, but they are also incapable of telling us when they will return to a balanced budget, even though this was an election promise.

Not too long ago, in 2015, the Conservatives managed to get our fiscal house in order. The Prime Minister and his Minister of Finance were lucky enough to inherit a balanced budget, at a time when global economic growth was on its way up.

This was after one of the worst global economic crises ever. I remind members that the Conservative government was the first G7 government to get its fiscal house in order and to even post a surplus in the wake of this great recession.

It is sometimes ironic to look back at what journalists were saying a year before the election campaign. I have here an article written by journalist Emmanuelle Latraverse, who wrote, on January 19, 2014, that one of the 2015 campaign issues would be the debate over how to spend the money accumulated by the Harper government. A responsible government would have used this money to pay down the debt, but instead, the Liberals chose to increase the debt and waste every single dollar.

It was not enough for them, so they had to borrow more. What will the 2019 campaign issue be? It will not be about what to do with the surplus, but when the government will balance the books.

Several articles have touched on this issue. In November, Jean-François Cliche wrote in Le Soleil:

When the economy is doing well, the government should seize the opportunity to get back in the black. In fact, injecting money into an economy that is doing well—whether by reducing interest rates or by running up deficits—may even be counterproductive and result in a sluggish economy that leads to a crisis.

When the most recent budget was presented, Sylvain Gilbert, a partner at Raymond Chabot Grant Thornton, stated, “It is very dangerous to run deficits when the economy is doing well.” He added, “[The Minister of Finance] has got himself in a bind, and it will be very difficult for him to get out of it if the economy starts going sideways.”

The problem is that they do not even know what they are doing. They cannot give us a date. We just want a date. When will they balance the budget?

By 2023, the Liberals will be spending more on servicing the debt than we currently spend on health care transfers. That is unacceptable.

I will conclude by once again asking my colleagues opposite a simple question: when will the Liberal government balance the budget? We are asking for a date, just a simple date.

Opposition Motion--FinanceBusiness of SupplyGovernment Orders

1:35 p.m.

Liberal

Ken McDonald Liberal Avalon, NL

Madam Speaker, my colleague opposite mentioned that the Prime Minister has a talent for acting and that he uses it here in the House. However, I did not hear him mention the talent that has been out in the media lately by some members on the other side. Would he like to comment on that talent?

Opposition Motion--FinanceBusiness of SupplyGovernment Orders

1:35 p.m.

Conservative

Luc Berthold Conservative Mégantic—L'Érable, QC

Madam Speaker, we are talking about balancing the budget, but Liberals cannot even answer the question. They use various kinds of pretexts because they really do not want to broach the dangerous topic of budgetary balance, so they try to change the channel. That is the last thing they want to talk about. I am sure that my colleague hears about the deficit in his riding. When will they balance the budget? It seems to me that we have borrowed enough money. This is a topic which must constantly surface in meetings with his constituents. He had the perfect opportunity to tell us when the government expects to return to zero deficit, but he failed to seize it.

Opposition Motion--FinanceBusiness of SupplyGovernment Orders

1:40 p.m.

NDP

Don Davies NDP Vancouver Kingsway, BC

Madam Speaker, traditional Keynesian economics would suggest that when the economy is struggling, governments can borrow money in order to prime the pump and make the investments that are necessary to get the economy moving. However, that must be balanced off when times are good, the economy is going well and the government runs a surplus, it should pay down the debt that was accumulated during the deficit times.

In 2008, the Conservatives with all-party support borrowed a lot of money and went into significant deficit in order to deal with the crisis at that time, but they ran deficits in 2009, 2010, 2011, 2012, 2013 and 2014, and arguably in 2015 as well, but that is a matter of debate. At the same time they stood in the House and bragged that Canada had the strongest economy of the G7. However, while they were saying that Canada had the strongest economy in the G7 and things were going well, they were not running surpluses and they were not paying down the debt. This is similar to the Liberal government today which is running massive deficits at the same time as saying our economy is doing really well, defying all Keynesian logic.

I am wondering if my hon. colleague has any comment on that. When should the government pay down debt and run surpluses if not when the economy is running well? Perhaps he could explain why the previous Conservative government did not do that.

Opposition Motion--FinanceBusiness of SupplyGovernment Orders

1:40 p.m.

Conservative

Luc Berthold Conservative Mégantic—L'Érable, QC

Madam Speaker, before the 2008 economic crisis, the previous Conservative government had paid back $30 billion on the national debt. If we were the last country hit by the economic crisis in 2008, it is in fact due to our good management of public funds. If Canada was the first G7 country to emerge from the crisis, it is due to the good government we had, which had Canadians' interests at heart and who had more in mind than the interest payments it would have to make by borrowing more, like the Liberal government is doing now.

The question remains: when will the Liberal government tell us at what date the budget will be balanced?

Opposition Motion--FinanceBusiness of SupplyGovernment Orders

1:40 p.m.

Spadina—Fort York Ontario

Liberal

Adam Vaughan LiberalParliamentary Secretary to the Minister of Families

Madam Speaker, I remind the House that the previous Conservative government inherited a $32-billion structural surplus, which the Conservatives turned into a deficit well before the recession.

Opposition Motion--FinanceBusiness of SupplyGovernment Orders

1:40 p.m.

An hon. member

No they didn't.

Opposition Motion--FinanceBusiness of SupplyGovernment Orders

1:40 p.m.

Liberal

Adam Vaughan Liberal Spadina—Fort York, ON

They did, in their first budget.

In the recession, they refused to engage in stimulus spending until the NDP and the Liberals forced them to prorogue Parliament and that is when, in a moment of absolute panic, they bought into the economic theory the member opposite just talked about. Following that, the Conservatives failed to balance the budget until the very last year they were in office. When they did that, they did not structurally correct the deficit. What they did was they sold stocks at a loss to cover the bill. In other words, they sold the furniture to pay the rent.

With the fiscal insanity of the previous government, why did the member opposite not resign?

Opposition Motion--FinanceBusiness of SupplyGovernment Orders

1:40 p.m.

Conservative

Luc Berthold Conservative Mégantic—L'Érable, QC

Madam Speaker, he admitted that we left the fiscal house in order. He admitted that we managed to return to a balanced budget. I think Paul Martin, former Liberal prime minister, must really be having some concerns. He worked really hard to bring the country back to a balanced budget. I wonder what he thinks today of the Liberal government being unable to envision a return to a balanced budget and not even giving us a date. When will the country return to a balanced budget?

Opposition Motion--FinanceBusiness of SupplyGovernment Orders

1:40 p.m.

NDP

The Assistant Deputy Speaker NDP Carol Hughes

I want to remind members if they have questions and comments, they should wait until I ask for questions and comments and then they can rise. Otherwise, I would ask them to be quiet until such time as that comes up.

Resuming debate, the hon. member for Saskatoon—Grasswood.

Opposition Motion--FinanceBusiness of SupplyGovernment Orders

1:40 p.m.

Conservative

Kevin Waugh Conservative Saskatoon—Grasswood, SK

Madam Speaker, I am pleased to rise today to speak in favour of the motion that has been brought forward by the official opposition. It demands that the Liberal government answer a very simple question. It is a question that has been asked repeatedly by Canadians for the last three years now. The question is this: In what year will the budget be balanced? It is as simple as that.

We call upon the Liberal government to finally be up front with Canadians and tell us in this week's fall economic statement in what year the budget will be balanced. This motion is reasonable. It is fair and it is certainly straightforward. The Liberal government should have no trouble telling Canadians from coast to coast to coast when it will balance the budget.

The Liberals clearly had no trouble telling Canadians during the 2015 election that they would balance the budget by 2019. That is just a year away, I should add. Why is it that as soon as they get into government, after piling on billions and billions of debt through reckless spending they suddenly seem to struggle with this simple question? Why is it that the Liberal government's most extensive track record is its ever-growing list of broken promises?

When the Liberals fail to tell Canadians time and time again when the budget will be balanced, they are not only failing to be accountable to the current generation of Canadians, they are failing to be accountable to future generations as well. The Liberal debt of today will become the higher taxes of tomorrow. These are the taxes which are heaped onto the shoulders of our children and our grandchildren. They did not ask to be overburdened with this Liberal debt. They did not ask to be the ones who will be stuck with the terrible task of paying for the deficits of today.

Does the Liberal government have any plans at all to lessen the burden which it continues to create for these future generations? Has it at least committed to reduce the rate at which it adds to the federal debt? Unfortunately for our children and our grandchildren, the answer is no. In fact, the Liberal government has just made the situation worse by increasing its reckless spending with each passing year.

The one thing that the Liberal government really excels at is its ability to keep digging itself into a hole which keeps getting deeper, deeper and deeper. The unfortunate thing is that the current generation and future generations of Canadians will be the ones who will bear the consequences of the future and the failure.

The irresponsibility of the Liberal government has significant costs for all Canadians. The size of the deficit in this year alone is nearly $20 billion, a figure which is three times larger than what the Liberals promised it would be. The Liberal government has added a remarkable $60 billion in debt. This is not what the Liberals promised to Canadians.

Last year alone the Liberal government spent $23 billion just to service the national debt, $23 billion. This is not what the Liberals promised to Canadians. Interest on the national debt now is expected to grow by two-thirds to $37 billion a year, which is almost as much as we spend on the entire health care transfers to provinces and territories. This is not what the Liberals promised to Canadians.

How can the Liberal government claim it stands for sunny ways, that it believes in supporting the middle class and that it supports the development of economic opportunity for all Canadians when it actively pursues a policy of fiscal mismanagement which will see more and more Canadian tax dollars going towards interest payments on the national debt? Compare it to the amount which is actually spent on health care transfers.

Canadians expect that their hard-earned tax dollars will go toward funding programs and services that benefit all Canadians. Unfortunately, reckless Liberal spending will make sure that increasingly large portions of those tax dollars simply go into the pockets of bankers and bond holders who own the interest on this ever-growing Liberal debt.

Perhaps what is most shocking about the debt of the Liberal government is it was completely avoidable. When we look back at 2015, the Liberals did not face a dire economic situation when they came into government just three years ago. In fact, the Liberals inherited a great fortune, which any government would dream of.

The Prime Minister inherited a balanced budget, which was left behind by our former Conservative government. He had the benefit of thriving U.S. and global economies, which had recovered from the worst of the 2008 recession. He could take advantage of booming housing markets in Toronto and Vancouver. He had the benefit of record low interest rates, never seen before in our lifetime. All of these added factors gave the Prime Minister a windfall of $20 billion in additional revenue alone last year. However, despite all this great fortune, the Prime Minister still somehow managed to spend it all in a matter of mere months, leaving all Canadians with almost absolutely nothing to show for it.

Instead of sunny ways and real change, the Prime Minister has left Canadians with a growing mountain of billions of dollars of debt, which is not going to be erased for many years to come. Instead of a budget which balances itself, like the Prime Minister actually promised in 2015, Finance Canada tells us that Canadians will now face at least 25 more years of deficit at the rate that the Liberal government engages in reckless spending.

Canadians are already facing the costs of higher interest, record household debt, and instead of helping to ease the burden faced by Canadians, the Liberal government is hurting Canadians by saddling them with the prospect of more massive tax increases just to fund the Prime Minister's reckless and inefficient spending habits.

Canadians deserve a government that actually works for them rather than against them. Sadly, the Liberal government only continues to disrespect hard-working taxpayers by making life more expensive for Canadians across this great country.

Because the Prime Minister never had to worry about money, he does not think or even worry much about Canadians when he carelessly spends it. We have seen that. He did not worry when he spent over $1.66 million on that failed trip to India, which only led to an international diplomatic debacle. He did not worry when he spent over $8 million, just a year ago, on a temporary ice hockey rink on the lawn of Parliament Hill. He certainly did not worry when he paid $4.5 billion of taxpayers' money to Kinder Morgan as a result of his failure to get the Trans Mountain expansion pipeline built.

How will the Liberals' newly purchased pipeline factor into this year's budget? We still do not know. It cost $4.5 billion. What is the Liberals' plan to sell the Trans Mountain pipeline? The Liberals still have absolutely no meaningful plans whatsoever to get this pipeline built.

This past May I spoke to the Liberal government's budget implementation bill. I asked the Liberal government whether it was fair to members of future generations of Canadians, like my granddaughter, Avery Thornhill, when we tell them that in 2018, the government has no hope at all of balancing the budget. The Liberals have repeatedly failed to give Canadians an answer to this question. That is why Conservatives are calling on the government today to announce in its fall economic update two days from now in what year the budget will finally be balanced.

Canadians deserve respect, and they deserve to know when the budget will be balanced by the current government.

Opposition Motion--FinanceBusiness of SupplyGovernment Orders

1:50 p.m.

Liberal

Chris Bittle Liberal St. Catharines, ON

Madam Speaker, I have been hearing speeches from members of the opposition who pretend to stand up for working-class Canadians and those most vulnerable in our society.

I look to the Conservatives' friends at Queen's Park, and we have seen the hon. Leader of the Opposition there to take orders and staff the premier on a number of occasions. However, what we have seen in terms of their approach has been first things first to cut education, and next to cut mental health spending, and most recently to cut the children's advocate and to cut funding for Francophone services and a Francophone university.

Does the Conservative Party approve of this path? Is this the Conservatives' plan for the Canadian people in 2019?

Opposition Motion--FinanceBusiness of SupplyGovernment Orders

1:50 p.m.

NDP

The Assistant Deputy Speaker NDP Carol Hughes

I want to remind some of the members on the opposition side that I am sure their colleague will be able to answer the question.

The hon. member for Saskatoon—Grasswood.

Opposition Motion--FinanceBusiness of SupplyGovernment Orders

1:55 p.m.

Conservative

Kevin Waugh Conservative Saskatoon—Grasswood, SK

Madam Speaker, this is ironic. Kathleen Wynne built up the biggest deficit in the history of Ontario. Let us not forget what Premier Doug Ford was left with: absolutely nothing. There was reckless spending by the Ontario Liberals.

What else is disturbing is that Liberal staffers at Queen's Park in Toronto have now moved to Ottawa to help the federal government. We should all be very worried about the staffers who left Ontario with a massive deficit and who are now sitting in Gerald Butts's office strategizing, taking money out of every Canadian's pocket each and every day.

Opposition Motion--FinanceBusiness of SupplyGovernment Orders

1:55 p.m.

Winnipeg North Manitoba

Liberal

Kevin Lamoureux LiberalParliamentary Secretary to the Leader of the Government in the House of Commons

Madam Speaker, I was a little surprised that the Conservatives decided to talk about deficits today. Those following the debate really have to appreciate the Conservatives. We have been around for 131 years. The Liberals have governed for the vast majority of that time, yet it is the Conservatives, with a minority of years, that have accrued the largest portion of Canada's deficit. Stephen Harper actually inherited a multi-billion dollar surplus, and even before the recession began, he turned that multi-billion dollar surplus into a multi-billion dollar deficit. Year after year, it was deficit, deficit, deficit, and the Conservatives want the Liberals to take advice from them, whose record was so abysmal?

Does my friend not recognize that when it comes to the deficit, the worst party in the House to go to would, in fact, be the Conservative Party?

Opposition Motion--FinanceBusiness of SupplyGovernment Orders

1:55 p.m.

Conservative

Kevin Waugh Conservative Saskatoon—Grasswood, SK

Madam Speaker, the question is when the government is going to balance the debt. When? We just want to know a date.

When I was a young parent with two kids, each Christmas our kids got money in their piggy banks. However, this Christmas, because of the Liberal government, parents are going to be given hammers. Why? It is because piggy banks in this country are not safe under the Liberal government as it continues its reckless spending.

Opposition Motion--FinanceBusiness of SupplyGovernment Orders

1:55 p.m.

Liberal

Mark Gerretsen Liberal Kingston and the Islands, ON

Madam Speaker, let us go back to the previous question, because the member did not actually answer it.

Is the member supportive of what the current Ontario provincial government is doing with its massive cuts to very important social programs, such as protecting French as a second language in Ontario and social services and education? By all measures, the Leader of the Opposition appears to take his marching orders from Doug Ford. Are the member and the Conservative Party supportive of what is going on?

Opposition Motion--FinanceBusiness of SupplyGovernment Orders

1:55 p.m.

Conservative

Kevin Waugh Conservative Saskatoon—Grasswood, SK

Madam Speaker, I would ask the hon. member if he would apologize on behalf of his father. His father was part of the major deficit the province is incurring today. Will the member stand in the House today and apologize on his father's behalf for putting Ontario residents into a massive deficit that they probably will never get out of because of—

Opposition Motion--FinanceBusiness of SupplyGovernment Orders

1:55 p.m.

Liberal

The Speaker Liberal Geoff Regan

Statements by members.

French Services in OntarioStatements By Members

1:55 p.m.

Bloc

Mario Beaulieu Bloc La Pointe-de-l'Île, QC

Mr. Speaker, last Thursday was a sad day for Franco-Ontarians and all francophones.

By cutting the French Language Services Commissioner position in Ontario and cancelling the proposed French-language university, Doug Ford's Conservatives are sending a clear message: francophones are second-class citizens. That is clear when we compare the situation of anglophones in Quebec to that of Franco-Ontarians. The truth is that English Canada tolerates the rights of francophones provided they keep their mouths shut and do not make any demands.

If they think Franco-Ontarians are going to put up with this, they have another thing coming. Franco-Ontarians won when none other than the Conservatives wanted to take away the Montfort, the only francophone hospital outside Quebec in Canada. They will win again if all francophones come together and stand up to this Anglocentric government in Ontario.

That is why, on behalf of the Bloc Québécois and thousands of Quebeckers, I say to Franco-Ontarians—

French Services in OntarioStatements By Members

2 p.m.

Liberal

The Speaker Liberal Geoff Regan

The hon. member for Mississauga—Lakeshore.

HousingStatements By Members

2 p.m.

Liberal

Sven Spengemann Liberal Mississauga—Lakeshore, ON

Mr. Speaker, around 1.7 million Canadian families do not have a home they can afford that meets their basic needs.

The 10-year, $40-billion investment our government is making, through the national housing strategy, will encourage the construction of affordable rental housing by providing low-cost loans through the rental construction financing initiative, giving more Canadians a place to call home.

I would like to recognize the invaluable role housing co-operatives play in the lives of the residents of Mississauga—Lakeshore and communities across our great nation. In our community, Brooks Co-op, Erin Court Co-op, Indwell, Springfield Co-op, the Peel-Halton Co-operative Housing Federation and the Co-operative Housing Federation of Canada are working hard on this front. I thank them for their leadership, and I look forward to continuing to champion their efforts.

Housing co-operatives are about much more than affordable housing. They are about building communities where neighbours look out for one another. They are about allowing members to reach their full potential. They are about building homes for Canadians.

Canada Border Services AgencyStatements By Members

2 p.m.

Conservative

Ted Falk Conservative Provencher, MB

Mr. Speaker, two weeks ago, the Liberal government announced that many border crossings across the country would be reducing their hours of operation, including three ports in my riding of Provencher. The earlier closing times will have a profound, negative economic and social impact on rural communities and the residents who call them home. It will limit their ability to access employment, health care and recreation.

Public meetings were held after the decision was already made, and many of those meetings pointed to the fact that the government is spending hundreds of millions of taxpayers' dollars on providing services for people who have illegally crossed into Canada, have not lived here and have never contributed to Canada. The government has even built them a pathway and welcome centre at our border port to make it easier for them to cross, all of this while it is reducing services for Canadians who simply want to cross their own border.

The Prime Minister needs to explain to Canadians why he is prioritizing illegal crossings while cutting services to Canadians who, all their lives, have worked hard, played by the rules, and paid their taxes.

Kerby CentreStatements By Members

2 p.m.

Liberal

Kent Hehr Liberal Calgary Centre, AB

Mr. Speaker, located in the fabulous constituency of Calgary Centre, the Kerby Centre is an outstanding organization that has provided support to Calgary seniors for nearly half a century. Members are joining us here in Ottawa today.

The Kerby Centre runs multiple invaluable services for seniors, from housing to counselling to social enterprises, like the second-hand clothing store. I also have lunch there on many a Wednesday.

I am proud that our Liberal federal government supports this dedicated group through programs like Canada summer jobs, the enabling accessibility fund, and new horizons for seniors. All of these programs help the Kerby Centre support seniors in my community.

I thank the Kerby Centre for its commitment to bettering the lives of Calgary seniors, and I look forward to it providing services for many more years to come.

Michelle PrinceStatements By Members

2 p.m.

NDP

Brian Masse NDP Windsor West, ON

Mr. Speaker, today I celebrate the remarkable and inspiring life of Michelle Prince, who passed away yesterday after five very public years of cancer during which she chose to live life to the fullest. Michelle did this despite three major surgeries and 80 cycles of chemo administered every other week, all while remaining a champion of spirit and showing her smile. In fact, she raised money for a hospital, created a new program for cancer patients and produced videos to help coach others.

She celebrated positives and in doing so inspired many to do the same, always fighting, never surrendering to the disease. Michelle is a heroine, and her story will remain on guard for those who need light in times of darkness.

Windsor thanks the Prince and Francis families for sharing Michelle with all of us. Their generous gift of time was precious.

To her husband Eddie and her children Sienna and Phoenix, I want to offer condolences and solidarity in celebrating Michelle's life. Please know that our community feels this great loss. We will honour her request by living each and every day in the moment. As Eddie shared, "Michelle has joined her friends, and they are dancing."