Debates of Feb. 3rd, 2022

Housing

[The Speaker, Liberal, Anthony Rota]

The hon. Minister of Housing.

[Ahmed Hussen, Liberal, Minister of Housing and Diversity and Inclusion]

Mr. Speaker, since we came into government, we have invested almost $30 billion in affordable housing measures.

My hon. friend talks about help for Canadians. Why did Conservatives vote against the Canada housing benefit, which is delivering real money into the pockets of Canadians to help them with rent? Why did they vote against the first-time homebuyer incentive, which is about making sure that Canadians have access to their dream of home ownership? Why did they vote against the rapid housing initiative, which has housed over 10,000 households and lifted people's lives up and enabled them not just to get by, but to get ahead?

We know what works. The Conservatives have no credibility on this issue.

Privacy

[René Villemure, Bloc, Trois-Rivières, QC]

Mr. Speaker, Ottawa has issued a call for tenders for a vendor to collect location data from all citizens' cellphones, without their knowledge, and share it with the Public Health Agency of Canada once it is anonymized. The deadline for the tendering process is tomorrow.

I do not want to be alarmist, but we must be vigilant in the face of such a lack of transparency. At the Standing Committee on Access to Information, Privacy and Ethics meeting on Monday, following a Bloc Québécois initiative, all parties of the House, including the Liberal Party, called for the tender to be suspended. I repeat, the deadline is tomorrow.

Will the minister suspend the tender, yes or no?

[Jean-Yves Duclos, Liberal, Minister of Health]

Mr. Speaker, I thank my hon. colleague for his question.

He is quite right to emphasize the importance of protecting people's privacy, especially in the context we have been living in for some time now, where privacy is not only a concern for most Canadians, but also requires concrete action and important discussion on the part of the Canadian government.

That is why, in just a few minutes, I will be speaking with members of the committee to explain why these data are confidential, private, disaggregated and anonymized, and why they are so important to the Canadian government.

[René Villemure, Bloc, Trois-Rivières, QC]

Mr. Speaker, the Bloc Québécois is not questioning the Public Health Agency of Canada's motives.

What we want is time. We want time for the ethics committee to make sure this move to collect massive amounts of personal data protects people's right to privacy. The tendering process closes tomorrow. The committee does not have time to investigate.

If there is one principle Health Canada should be thoroughly familiar with, it is the precautionary principle. Will the Minister suspend the tender, yes or no?

[Jean-Yves Duclos, Liberal, Minister of Health]

Mr. Speaker, we have been adhering to the precautionary principle right from day one with respect to COVID‑19. We have applied it to protecting personal information, of course, as well as to protecting people's health and safety.

Sadly, tens of thousands of Canadians have died in the past 22 months, and people have had to forgo hundreds of billions in employment income. There is so much fear, so much worry. Families are suffering so much. That is why we have to protect both safety and privacy.

The Economy

[Kerry-Lynne Findlay, Conservative, South Surrey—White Rock, BC]

Mr. Speaker, we all know that the Prime Minister is not concerned about monetary policy, but Canadians are.

I ran into my constituent, Anousha, at the grocery store in January. She was close to tears, and frankly scared about how she was going to get her family through in heat and meat all this winter. The price of gas for Anousha to get her from work to her kids' school is, wait for it, $1.78 a litre in B.C. There is no false narrative there.

Will the government tell us what plan it has to dry Anousha’s tears?

[Chrystia Freeland, Liberal, Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of Finance]

Mr. Speaker, I have already spoken about something Canadians understand, which is that inflation is a global phenomenon.

We understand that affordability is a challenge for many Canadians. Let me talk about what our government is doing to help. A single mother with two children will receive up to $13,660 from the Canada child benefit. An average family in Saskatchewan will receive nearly $1,000 from the climate action incentive. Seniors received an extra $500 through the GIS this summer, and we are increasing OAS by 10%.

[Marilyn Gladu, Conservative, Sarnia—Lambton, ON]

Mr. Speaker, people living on a fixed income in my riding cannot afford to live.

With the Liberals' policies driving up the cost of home heating, their trucker mandates driving up food prices, the out-of-control escalation in the housing market, which they have not addressed, and the CERB GIS issue, which is still not fixed, people are being driven into homelessness.

When will the Liberals quit increasing the carbon tax, roll back the mandates and take action to help struggling Canadians?

[Chrystia Freeland, Liberal, Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of Finance]

Mr. Speaker, the member opposite spoke about people living on a fixed income, so let me remind the member that seniors received an extra $500 through the GIS this summer, and we are increasing the OAS by 15%. As I announced in the fall update, we are making a one-time payment to support seniors who qualify for the GIS who were challenged because they received the CERB.

Let me talk about students. They will save more than $3,000 through our plan to eliminate federal interest on student and apprentice loans. On child care, I could say more—

[The Speaker, Liberal, Anthony Rota]

The hon. member for Calgary Shepard.

[Tom Kmiec, Conservative, Calgary Shepard, AB]

Mr. Speaker, Jodi in my riding of Calgary Shepard is the latest victim of the Liberal cost-of-living inflation. She is on a fixed income and got her January, 2022, ENMAX bill, which was $638 for her utilities. That was a $200 increase over the last month. She said that this was absurd, and she is right. It is absurd. She said, “This is tough. It is like another mortgage payment.”

I would ask the government this: Is she another victim of Justinflation?

[Chrystia Freeland, Liberal, Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of Finance]

Mr. Speaker, I will tell the member what is exactly like another mortgage payment for a young family with children: exorbitant fees for early learning and child care. That is why we are so proud to be putting in place a plan to make early learning and child care affordable across the country, including in Alberta where costs will go down 50% this year.

What I do not understand is how the Conservatives have the temerity to talk about affordability, but they campaigned on killing our early learning and child care plan.

Natural Resources

[Viviane LaPointe, Liberal, Sudbury, ON]

Mr. Speaker, my riding of Sudbury has a long, proud mining history.

Canada has the potential to become a world leader in critical minerals.

Could the Minister of Innovation, Science and Industry give us an update on the critical mining strategy the government is developing?

[François-Philippe Champagne, Liberal, Minister of Innovation]

Mr. Speaker, I thank my colleague for the question and for the great work she does on behalf of her constituents in Sudbury.

As the member said, Canada has a considerable competitive advantage when it comes to critical minerals. That is why we are developing a pan-Canadian critical minerals strategy with the Minister of Natural Resources to position Canada as the leader in exploring, extracting, processing and producing, so that we can become a global leader and develop a battery manufacturing ecosystem here in Canada.

The Economy

[Rob Moore, Conservative, Fundy Royal, NB]

Mr. Speaker, a study recently released out of Johns Hopkins University is ringing the alarm bells on the devastating effects of lockdowns. It concluded that lockdowns are ineffective in reducing mortality rates. The study goes as far as saying that “lockdowns should be rejected out of hand as a pandemic policy instrument.” However, the Liberal government continues to promote lockdowns across Canada.

Will the Prime Minister catch up to the science, apologize to Canadians, get out of the way and let people earn a paycheque again?

[Jean-Yves Duclos, Liberal, Minister of Health]

Mr. Speaker, I thank my colleague for that question.

As we all know, or should know at least, the enemy is not vaccination. The enemy is COVID-19. One way to avoid lockdowns, and one way to return to a more normal life, is to be vaccinated. I hear that most members of the House have made the right choice. All members of the House must make the right choice.

[John Williamson, Conservative, New Brunswick Southwest, NB]

Mr. Speaker, when the Liberals came to power they promised to help Canadian families. Instead, this government has made everything more expensive. Their inflationary policies are the largest cost increase of all. Inflation has made us all poorer, because it adds to the price of everything. Today, the price of gasoline in my riding is over $1.50 a litre. It is 35% less across the border, in the state of Maine.

Does the finance minister understand that the government's policies are hurting Canadians and making us all poorer?

[Karina Gould, Liberal, Minister of Families]

Mr. Speaker, unlike the members opposite, we are actually taking concrete actions to help Canadians with the high cost of living.

In fact, in that member's province of New Brunswick, we worked with the provincial government to come to a historic child care agreement last December, which is going to help families in New Brunswick see a 50% reduction in fees this year. That is going to help with the high cost of living. That is going to help with their bottom line.

Our government is committed to supporting families, and we are going to do that right across the country.

[Bernard Généreux, Conservative, Montmagny—L'Islet—Kamouraska—Rivière-du-Loup, QC]

Mr. Speaker, my constituents are literally in distress. We are not just talking about unemployed people who are unable to get their EI benefits, because that is a crisis in itself, but we are also talking about full‑time workers and people who earn a very good living but are no longer able to make ends meet.

A litre of gas costs $1.61 in Rivière‑du‑Loup today. Grocery store prices are up 8% due to inflation, as are heating costs. The price of everything is going up at an unbelievable rate. Meanwhile, the government is sitting on its hands, unable to solve the problem.

Dealing with inflation is urgent. What is the government going to do?

[Chrystia Freeland, Liberal, Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of Finance]

Mr. Speaker, as I have explained many times before, and as Canadians fully understand, inflation is a global phenomenon. The Canadian economy and Canadians themselves are very resilient.

At the same time, our government understands the cost-of-living challenges that Canadians face. We are taking tangible action to help Canadians. For example, a single mother with two children will receive up to $13,000 from the Canada child benefit. An average family in Saskatchewan will receive almost—

Small Business

[Sonia Sidhu, Liberal, Brampton South, ON]

Mr. Speaker, our government announced the first-ever women entrepreneurship strategy, a now $6-billion program to advance women's economic empowerment. Supporting women entrepreneurs and small business owners is now more important than ever, especially for our economic recovery from COVID-19.

Can the Minister of International Trade, Export Promotion, Small Business and Economic Development update us on her recent announcement about the women entrepreneurship ecosystem fund, and how it will support women who were especially hit hard during the pandemic?

[Mary Ng, Liberal, Minister of International Trade]

Mr. Speaker, the women entrepreneurship strategy ecosystem fund is working for women entrepreneurs and businesses. It has helped 500 women start new businesses, and 7,000 women increase and grow their existing businesses.

We know, though, that women entrepreneurs continue to face barriers. That is why I was very pleased to announce last week a new call for proposals. It is a $25-million investment with the aim of removing systemic barriers and creating more equal access to resources for intersectionally diverse and underserved women in business so they can succeed.

Poverty

[Leah Gazan, NDP, Winnipeg Centre, MB]

Mr. Speaker, under the Liberals, soaring food prices are squeezing families who are already struggling to make ends meet. This is resulting in children across Canada, including in my riding of Winnipeg Centre, going to school hungry, yet we are the only G7 country without a national school meal program. No child should ever have to go to school hungry.

Will the Liberals commit today to implementing a national school meal program?

[Karina Gould, Liberal, Minister of Families]

Mr. Speaker, indeed, I look forward to working with my hon. colleague on this initiative. We both agree that it is unacceptable for children to go to school hungry, and that is why it is in my mandate letter as well as in the mandate letter of the Minister of Agriculture.

I look forward to working with her and stakeholders to deliver on this important policy so that we can support our children, so they are not hungry, and so they have the best learning outcomes possible.