Mr. Speaker, I find it somewhat ironic that on this day, Groundhog Day, not unlike the plot of the movie of the same name, we find ourselves back in this place making further adjustments to the government's response to the pandemic. I do not offer that comment as a criticism of the government. I raise that point to serve as a reminder that we have been here before.
I also raise the point because we should all recognize that we may be here again, doing something similar in the future. I believe all of us would agree that, ideally, we would prefer that would not be the case. I am certain we would much rather see these troubled times put behind us. However, we know that the vaccine rollout has not, to date, gone well for Canada. We know that new and more deadly variants of this virus are being identified in different parts of Canada, and that should be concerning to us all.
For the record, I do not mention the slow pace of vaccine rollouts in my comments today as a political tack. I am certain that the government, like any government, would like to see a more timely and successful vaccine rollout. I would also add that that is not what we are here to debate in this bill today.
I am raising these concerns for a different reason, and I will come back to that. Let us first acknowledge that this bill proposes measures that we all support.
We support the enhancements to the Canada child benefit. The political notion of providing direct support to families was actually developed by a Conservative government in spite of the Liberals' claims at the time that parents would waste the money on beer and popcorn. When they came to power, the Liberals adopted this program and made other improvements. I have to give them credit for that.
In Canada, during the pandemic, the official opposition also supported programs such as the CERB, the Canada emergency wage subsidy and the Canada emergency business account. There may have been some disagreements about the best way to implement them, however, in principle, we agreed with these programs.
For that reason, I will not be focusing today on the elements of the debate on which we agree. As many of us know, this bill is essentially divided into seven different parts. The official opposition supports most parts of the bill. However, we strongly disagree with part 7.
Part 7 of the bill proposes to increase the Borrowing Authority Act, basically to add another $323 billion in incremental borrowing until March 31, 2024. The official opposition would prefer to split this from the bill so that matters we do agree on can be voted on separately. We believe it is important to have a separate debate on that borrowing, which significantly increases our debt. Before some might say to themselves that I am being a typical Conservative, I would ask that everyone hears me out.
First, let me summarize briefly where we are. In 2015, the Liberal government promised to run modest deficits before returning to a balanced budget in 2019. Every person, whether in the chamber or here virtually, knows this did not happen. I am not here to revisit that, but simply to place it on the record as being a factual point.
In 2019, given the absence of following that fiscal plan, a new fiscal plan came from the government, and it was based on debt-to-GDP ratio. The Liberal thinking told us that as long as our debt-to-GDP ratio remained within certain parameters, everything would be fine. However, every person participating in this debate, whether in the chamber or attending virtually, knows that the debt-to-GDP targets are have now been thrown out the window. Again, I raise that because it is factually true.
We are now in a new situation, where the latest Liberal thinking has it that we cannot afford not to borrow more money, since interest rates are so low. Just because interest rates are this low it does not mean that it is okay to borrow so much money.
One has to wonder: What would happen if this plan, much like the Liberals' previous financial plans, proved to be wrong? What will happen if, or rather when, interest rates rise?
It is our job to be asking these questions. We need to ask ourselves how the decisions we are making today will affect Canadians in the future. If we are being honest with ourselves, how would we answer that question?
Some may say that hypothetical questions are irrelevant and that we need to focus on the now, since we are in the middle of a pandemic. I would like to take these people back to the same period last year.
One year ago, we had a health minister who told us that border closures would not work, and that travel restrictions would not only not work, but also could actually be harmful. We were told that they could stigmatize others. On that same note, we were also told that wearing masks was not recommended, as they would provide a false sense of security and should be avoided.
Now we all know how those polices turned out. I am not looking to belittle the government or government members. I am simply looking to point out how spectacularly wrong this advice was. How and why does this matter in the bill that we are debating today? It is because we have to accept that we have new and more deadly variants of this virus and that we are well behind in the vaccination fight against the original variant.
We may be in this fight for much longer than any of us would have ever anticipated or want to be. Obviously, we all have to hope and work hard to ensure that that is not the case. At the same time, we have to be prepared. That brings me back to part 7 of this bill, which fiscally proposes unprecedented borrowing to continue the firehose-like spending.
I would like to believe that most of us, even if it is not all of us, understand that the federal government cannot keep spending at the same rate as it has been. These expenditures are not sustainable in the long term. The Parliamentary Budget Officer said so, as did other leading economists.
Obviously, the government is very much hoping that this record spending will help us get through the pandemic. However, at some point, we will have to step back and ask ourselves whether the rate of spending is commensurate with how long we can actually fight the pandemic.
That brings me to my next question. Do we want these issues to be asked, debated and examined by Parliament or do we want to continue to allow the Liberal government to sign blank cheques and trust it to spend money in secret, just as it has been doing so far?
I think we all know the answer to that question.
We have an official opposition, and a third and a fourth party for a reason. It is to hold the government to account and now, more than ever, we need to do that job. I am hopeful that other members of this House will see the benefits of splitting part 7 from this bill and will agree.