Debates of Feb. 4th, 2022

Economic and Fiscal Update Implementation Act, 2021

[Dan Muys, Conservative, Flamborough—Glanbrook, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I work collaboratively with all other MPs in the Hamilton area. We do so on a regular basis when we work together.

I thank the member for the announcement of rural broadband in Flamborough—Glanbrook. There is a lot more work to do. I made that point yesterday in the House. While 47 is great, there are 8,000 rural homes, my own being one of them, where internet is insufficient. Let us work together and keep that going.

[Monique Pauzé, Bloc, Repentigny, QC]

Mr. Speaker, my colleague from Flamborough—Glanbrook spoke a lot about what is missing from Bill C-8, namely, the labour and supply chain shortages. I would add to that funding for social and affordable housing.

The Bloc Québécois is a bit concerned about what Bill C-8 has too much of. I am talking about the fact that the government wants to meddle in property taxation. Once again, the government is infringing on other jurisdictions. What does my colleague think about the way the government is once again infringing on Quebec and municipal jurisdictions?

[Dan Muys, Conservative, Flamborough—Glanbrook, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I have lived in Alberta and Quebec, and I understand that Canada is a complex country. We need to respect our provinces and our federal government. I take that to heart.

To her question about housing, I raised in my comments that housing is something we need desperately in my part of the world. We are short 110,000 homes in the Hamilton area simply to catch up, so I certainly encourage all of the investment in housing that can happen and await the government's housing strategy.

[Dan Albas, Conservative, Central Okanagan—Similkameen—Nicola, BC]

Mr. Speaker, it is always an honour to rise in this place, particularly after such a great member. What a speech, and I congratulate him on it.

I believe few would dispute that we live in highly unusual times. Indeed, we are charting a path through a pandemic without a playbook. This is not the fault of the government. Every government in the world is in the same situation. We all know different governments have proposed different ways of moving forward. We must recognize this, and I say “we” because we, in large part, unanimously agreed upon most of the fiscal measures to this point. Canadians sent a minority Parliament to Ottawa, and aside from the Prime Minister's shameless attempt to stage a power grab in calling an expensive and unnecessary election, we are back again in a minority situation.

What I believe we must recognize is that, rightly or wrongly, our fiscal cupboards were literally spent dry responding to the pandemic. I am not here to debate the past; I am simply pointing out the obvious. A significant portion of Canada's fiscal capacity has been spent. It is gone. We must recognize that. Why? It is because in the event we run into another type of future emergency situation, we will have less fiscal room to respond.

Again, I do not rise and say this to point fingers of blame. I raise this because we must recognize that going forward we must be very careful on how we proceed fiscally. Let me give an example of this. If we have learned anything during this pandemic, it is that our health care system was ill-equipped to deal with stresses and demands placed on it, and more so now, when we see fully vaccinated Canadians who find themselves in our hospitals and ICUs. Every premier of every political stripe is clear that the current Canada health transfer is not enough to meet the needs of Canadians now or going forward.

Here is something I would like to share with every member of the House: The Canada health care transfer stands at just over $45 billion a year. In this current fiscal update bill, spending is forecast to increase to over $55 billion in the fiscal year 2026-27. In other words, there will be an increase of $10 billion over that time frame. I am hopeful that my friends in the fourth party heard that clearly, as they also have a bad habit of referring to increases in health care spending as cuts.

Getting back to the increase in health spending, there will be $10 billion in increased Canada health transfer spending between now and fiscal year 2026-27. However, here is the problem: Today, the interest we pay on servicing our debt is just over $20 billion. Over that same time, it too will increase. The same budget bill forecasts that these debt-servicing costs will increase to almost $41 billion by fiscal year end 2026-27.

I can already hear members of the governing party. “Debt-to-GDP ratio”, they will say. “A AAA credit rating”, they will say. However, here is the thing. Between now and fiscal year 2026-27, we know two things: that the Canada health transfer will increase by $10 billion and servicing our debt will increase by over $20 billion. There will be $10 billion on health and $20 billion on debt servicing. To be clear, our interest costs for servicing our debt are climbing at twice the rate of our increases in the Canada health transfer. Does anyone else in this chamber not see such a serious problem with this, aside from the finance minister? She made it very clear yesterday that she does not.

Let us keep in mind that the doubling of interest we are paying on our debt is based on today's interests rates, and we all know those interest rates will not stay low. If there is one thing I believe all Canadians are united on, it is how much we value our health care system, particularly now more than ever.

Everyone in this room knows health care spending is on the minds of all Canadians. Let us not forget that we have an aging population and there will be fewer working Canadians supporting an increasing number of retired Canadians. The demographics on this are clear. I raise this, aside from the reason I have already stated, because we know this bill proposes once again even more stimulus spending.

Before people start dismissing questions as a typical Conservative question, let us remember it is our very own Parliamentary Budget Officer who scrutinized these numbers. The PBO, as we know, has also come out saying that stimulus spending is not needed. Let us recognize why the Parliamentary Budget Office has said this. Unfortunately with today's job numbers, these are probably a little out of date, but previously, as of last week, the PBO pointed out that Canada had recovered 106% of the jobs that were lost at the onset of the pandemic. This is a statistic I have heard often crowed by members of the government. Earlier this week, our finance minister, who is also the Deputy Prime Minister, stated:

Yesterday, Statistics Canada published new data showing that our GDP increased by 0.6% in November. That means that by the time omicron emerged, our economy had completely recovered from the COVID-19 recession.

To recap, by the government's own acknowledgement, both our employment rate and our GDP are fully recovered. Therefore, why borrow more money for more spending when the objective of the spending has largely been met? Again, this is not me pointing this out. The Parliamentary Budget Office has noted the same things. This is literally spending for the sake of spending. It is a government that claims it is all about science, data and facts. Well, the data and facts are clear here. In fact, we have heard the finance minister confirm them.

Let us change gears for a moment. We know inflation is at a 30-year high. We know that Canadian paycheques are getting smaller because Canada pension plan rates and EI deductions, which are planned to be unfrozen, are going to be getting bigger. No matter how they cut it, these two factors leave less money in Canadian households at the time when carbon taxes are going up, online streaming services are now taxed, wireless cellphone bills did not get magically cut by 25%, taxes on alcohol are increasing federally yet again, and back at the local level, property taxes are up and home insurance rates are going through the roof, especially for those in strata situations in condominiums. No matter how we look at it, Canadians are being hit hard and, it seems, from almost every angle.

Affordability is the single greatest concern now of many Canadian households. There is an elephant in the room that few want to discuss, and that is household debt. Household debt is at a record high. That matters because Canadians are living paycheque to paycheque as it is. The cost of living is basically out of control right now, and no matter how much we debate in this place who is responsible for that, that debate does not help those Canadians struggling to pay the bills.

Let me ask a question for everyone in this chamber. What happens when the interest rate increases? What happens when those rates start coming up again? That, in turn, means that payments on record household debt are also going to increase. What happens when Canadians can no longer make ends meet? What happens when their variable rate mortgage increases by $500, $400 or more a month, and they just cannot afford that?

When their fixed mortgage rate expires and they cannot afford the payments at a higher interest rate at renewal, what happens? There is certainly a growing number of citizens in my riding asking these questions, and I am sure all of the members have heard similar concerns and realities in their own ridings.

We cannot ignore that, but Bill C-8 completely does. If anything, it would only make that situation worse, and that is why I cannot and will not support this bill. Canadians need a solid economic plan for affordability in the path of increasing inflation and interest rates. Bill C-8, unfortunately, is not it. I thank all members for listening to my speech today.

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

Mr. Speaker, the Conservative right has spoken in the last couple of days. They are not going to support Bill C-8. They are going to say it is because government needs to cut back and stop expenditures. The member just referenced that.

Bill C-8 provides over one billion dollars for purchasing rapid tests. Rapid tests are absolutely essential to continuing to support small businesses and Canadians.

If Ottawa does not purchase rapid tests for distribution to the provinces and territories, who does the Conservative Party believe should be purchasing them? Should it be the provincial governments, individuals, or businesses?

[Dan Albas, Conservative, Central Okanagan—Similkameen—Nicola, BC]

Mr. Speaker, I will give the member opposite a direct answer. First of all, in British Columbia we do not have access to rapid tests. The province has not decided to use those, and out of respect for provincial jurisdiction, I would like to hear the answer as to why it has not included them. However, we do not have access to those for businesses, schools and whatnot in the capacity seen in other provinces.

The member politicized, I hope inadvertently in his comments, the Parliamentary Budget Officer, who is a non-partisan officer of Parliament, here to serve everyone, including those who are not of a party status. It is not just me. If the member wants to call me some Conservative, right-wing, Attila the Hun or whatever, he can go ahead and do that, but for gosh sakes, let us bring some decorum and treat the Parliamentary Budget Officer with the respect that is deserved of that office and this place.

[Monique Pauzé, Bloc, Repentigny, QC]

Mr. Speaker, my compliments to the member, who is a colleague of mine on the Standing Committee on Environment and Sustainable Development. He made it clear that money does not grow on trees.

Last spring's federal budget contained a surprise: measures to end lenient treatment for tax evasion. I think that is a source of revenue that Canadian tax authorities need to tap so we can do things like increase health transfers. However, the anti-tax haven measures announced in the spring do not appear in Bill C‑8. They seem to have fallen off the radar. What are my colleague's thoughts on that?

[Dan Albas, Conservative, Central Okanagan—Similkameen—Nicola, BC]

Mr. Speaker, I want to thank the member for her question and for the work she does on the environment committee with me and other members. I certainly always appreciate her interventions.

Let me start by saying that anyone who evades their taxes, anyone who tries to work outside the system, should be brought in to pay their fair share. On the flip side, I do believe the Government of Canada, and we have seen this in continual Transparency International reports, which specifically cite the government's inaction on things like money laundering.

The province of British Columbia set up the Cohen Commission and has received a final report. One thing that did happen is that they took action dealing with things like casinos, but those activities moved to other provinces. Whether it is tax evasion or money laundering, the government has been lax, and it is at the expense of so many. Money laundering is a scourge and needs to be stopped.

[Jenny Kwan, NDP, Vancouver East, BC]

Mr. Speaker, one of the issues that the member raises is inflation and that ties into the cost of housing. Along with inflation, there are many factors impacting the huge rise in the cost of housing. Part of that is the financialization of housing where people are treating housing as though it is a stock market. REITs are part of the problem, and the government has not taken any action with respect to that.

Would the member and the Conservatives support bringing in measures to address the financialization of housing and particularly putting a moratorium on REITs?

[Dan Albas, Conservative, Central Okanagan—Similkameen—Nicola, BC]

Mr. Speaker, I want to thank my fellow member from British Columbia and say that she has done more than her fair share to bring up the lack of action on housing, particularly in her riding, and the lack of federal monies, which the government continues to say are coming.

When it comes to financialization, I do have some concerns about how our economy under the government is going. The finance committee has recently been holding hearings on housing. We should be looking to it for what the recommendations are.

However, if an entrepreneur right now has $100,000 and wonders if they should put that in their business, in a new factory, new equipment, hiring new people or purchasing a home, people will say that productive capital should go to a home. That does not hire people. That does not put more people to work. That does not make our economy more innovative.

Unfortunately, until the government actually starts addressing these problems, we are going to see real estate dominating our economy. It may not be good to have all our eggs in one basket.

[Heather McPherson, NDP, Edmonton Strathcona, AB]

Mr. Speaker, I would like to say how happy I am to have the opportunity to speak to Bill C-8 today.

I will start my comments today talking a bit about how much people in Canada and around the world have been struggling during this pandemic. The past two years have been extremely hard for so many people in Canada and around the world. None of us imagined in March 2020, when we all left this place, that we would still be in a pandemic situation two years later, so I get the frustration we are seeing. I get why people want to get their lives back to normal.

I want to travel. I want to do the things we used to be able to do before COVID. Unfortunately, COVID-19 is not over, and we still need the public health measures that are so important to keep people safe and our health care system intact.

One of the things I will start with, and nobody in this House will be surprised to hear me say this, is that I am very disappointed in where we are at in this situation, because I think we have not done a very good job globally of ensuring vaccines went out to everybody around the world. I think that during this pandemic, we would not be in the situation we are in, dealing with yet another variant, if we had done global vaccine equity more appropriately.

This is concerning to me because I look at some of the problems facing humanity that are global in scope, and I see the response to COVID-19 as a precursor, and it is a worrying indication of our inability to find global solutions to some of these global problems, such as the climate crisis and increasing inequality.

As somebody who is vaccinated, I am delighted I am vaccinated. I am delighted my elderly parents are vaccinated and that my children have been able to be vaccinated. However, I want members in the House to understand that only 2.6% of people in Nigeria and only 2.9% of people in Tanzania have had access to a vaccine.

We are dealing today with Bill C-8 and some things that are being put in place to help people as we continue to go through this pandemic. However, I think it would be a missed opportunity for me to not say in this House that I blame the global response, and the inability of our government to help get vaccines into the arms of people around the world, for this variant.

I am going to talk a bit about some of the things within Bill C-8 that I like. I like that there is a tax credit for teachers in there. I like that there is a tax for housing owned by non-Canadians that is not being lived in.

I like some of the changes to EI, but the New Democratic Party would have made different choices. We do not think this does enough to help Canadians considering where we are right now. The changes to EI will not help all of the folks we need to help. It will not do enough. I know the government has the opportunity to bring forward legislation that would do more, and I would encourage it to do that.

Another thing I like within this bill is the ventilation for SMEs, small and medium enterprises, and schools. In August of 2020, I stood in this House and brought forward a unanimous consent motion asking for $2 billion to go out to the provinces to help with a safer restart of schools, and the government did that. It sent $2 billion to the provinces to make schools safer.

That was in 2020. That is when we needed to invest in ventilation for schools. That is when we needed to see that. We are going into two years now. There is no downside to increasing ventilation in our schools, as there is nothing better we could do to make our teachers and students safer when they are in school.

I will also say that, while I think it should have happened two years ago, I do not think this is enough. When I look at the amount of money there, it is going to provide less than $5,000 per Alberta school. That might work in other provinces, but in the province of Alberta, our premier is cutting funding for schools right now.

We have 2,400 school-aged children who have COVID-19 right now in Alberta. That is just the number we know about, because like other parts of the country, there is no testing happening unless people are very ill. Some people estimate the number of school-aged children in my province who have COVID-19 at probably closer to 20,000, and we do not know the long-term impacts of COVID on children.

In Alberta, we also need strings attached to programs like this, because we have seen this before. We have seen this a lot of times. Last year, we learned that the Government of Alberta was sitting on millions in unspent federal COVID emergency funding, more than any other province. There needs to be strings attached to make sure that these dollars get to the schools and help the teachers, students and support staff who need them. While I do like the ventilation piece in the bill, I think there are some loopholes there that we need to close.

I will talk about one thing that I really dislike about the bill before us. I do not know how many times members of the New Democrats have stood in the House and talked to the government about the serious attack that is happening on seniors in this country with the guaranteed income supplement, GIS, that has been clawed back from them. We know that the cost of living has hit Canadians. We know that things have gotten more expensive, but the two million seniors who live at or below the poverty line are the most vulnerable, and they have been hit the hardest.

I will tell members about some of these seniors who applied for the CERB benefit, for COVID benefits, because their Prime Minister told them to. I will tell members about some of these seniors who were eligible for it and who are now unable to pay their rent, buy their medications or buy food in this country and in my community. There are seniors like Ben who, because of a learning disability, has spent his entire life struggling to support himself doing manual labour for minimum wage, which is what he was doing when COVID hit. Now the business he worked for is gone, a victim of Alberta's economic crisis in COVID-19, and without the guaranteed income supplement he relied on, Ben's total income from OAS and CPP is less than his monthly rent, and he is facing eviction. At 73, Ben is out in the Edmonton winter in the bitter cold, knocking on doors and trying to find work during a pandemic.

The Liberals will tell us that they get it, that they heard us and that they fixed the problem. They are going to give Ben help in May. They think it is okay for Ben to be on the streets unable to meet his basic needs until May. However, the solution is so easy. The Liberals could fix this tomorrow. They could fix this for seniors across this country tomorrow, yet they are going to make those seniors wait and suffer and potentially die, because they are going to delay until May. It breaks my heart.

I can tell members about other seniors, numerous seniors, across this country and in my riding of Edmonton Strathcona. I want to raise this because it did not have to be this way. All this government had to do was exempt CERB income from the calculation for the GIS. That is all it had to do. It was so easy. The fact that it did not tells us all we need to know about the priorities of the Liberal government.

There are other things that are missing in the bill. There is nothing on a just transition for workers. In Alberta, we really need to start thinking of a plan for how we are going to help our energy workers. There is no funding for public transportation operations. There is nothing for energy efficiency retrofits for low-income households. There is nothing for dental, mental or pharmacare coverage. There are no measures to eliminate tax havens, to eliminate tax evasion or to even have better law enforcement. There is no wealth tax.

While there are things in Bill C-8 that I support, things that would move us in the right direction, the government missed an opportunity. I really hope that the Liberals will reflect on that and think about how they can fix some of the gaps that Bill C-8 left behind.

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

Mr. Speaker, I wonder if the member will help me out and provide some advice in terms of what she would do.

A constituent of mine who was collecting GIS gave me a call indicating that her GIS was going to be cut back. When she explained the situation she said, “When I was collecting GIS, I was actually making some money on the side. I was collecting quite a bit in terms of babysitting.” As a result of collecting the babysitting money, it caused some issues in terms of her having not claimed it.

In situations such as this, are there any circumstances at all from the NDP's perspective where someone who maybe should not have been collecting the CERB should be obligated, in any fashion, to pay it back?

[Heather McPherson, NDP, Edmonton Strathcona, AB]

Mr. Speaker, I am very disappointed that the member is blaming at-risk seniors for the situation his government has put them in.

Let me put a question back to him. Perhaps the member could tell me if he thinks there are any examples where a corporation that used money for the wrong things should be asked to pay it back. The government appears to think corporations never have to pay it back, even they are using it to pay scab labour in my riding so they can lock out their workers.

Instead of attacking vulnerable seniors, let us look at making it more equitable for them, please.

[Ziad Aboultaif, Conservative, Edmonton Manning, AB]

Mr. Speaker, I congratulate my colleague from Edmonton Strathcona on her speech, which touched on many points. One item I was hoping she would talk about is the housing crisis. Right now, we basically have a housing economy. The economy is run by the real estate industry, which is very dangerous for seniors, health care transfers and education. Everything has been affected by this crisis.

Does she agree that the government is just sitting on the sidelines and watching what is happening in what I call the biggest economic massacre in Canada?

[Heather McPherson, NDP, Edmonton Strathcona, AB]

Mr. Speaker, my neighbour from Edmonton Manning and I share a beautiful city. I met with the mayor of Edmonton recently to talk about the housing crisis in Edmonton and the failure of the federal government to do what needs to be done, things like an indigenous housing strategy developed with the input of indigenous people.

Obviously, the housing crisis is desperate across the country, but one of the problems I see is the fact that we do not have a strong housing strategy for indigenous people in our country. That is something that has been promised and the government has absolutely sat on the sidelines and has not done anything to make that happen. We are well past the deadline.

[Christine Normandin, Bloc, Saint-Jean, QC]

Mr. Speaker, I would like to ask my colleague from Edmonton Strathcona the same question I asked the member for Kitchener Centre earlier.

The Bloc Québécois agrees with the NDP and the Green Party that underused housing should be taxed. What rubs us the wrong way, though, is the federal government grabbing a piece of the property tax pie, the one remaining area of jurisdiction it has not yet encroached on.

I think it would be more appropriate for the federal government to work with municipalities, because they should be the ones collecting this tax and using it for their infrastructure. They could even target more people than Bill C‑8, which currently sets out a lot of exceptions. What are my colleague's thoughts on that?

[Heather McPherson, NDP, Edmonton Strathcona, AB]

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

I am sorry, but I am going to answer in English.

I am learning. My French is a work-in-progress.

There needs to be intervention from all levels of government. It is important we have that. In the province of Alberta, it is particularly important that we are able to work with municipalities because our provincial government seems very unwilling to support some of these initiatives and has been a barrier to our being able to achieve the things we want to achieve at the federal, municipal and provincial levels. Absolutely, there is an opportunity for the federal government to work with municipal governments. If one has a government that is more open to that then maybe even provincial governments, but that is not the case in Alberta.

[Stephanie Kusie, Conservative, Calgary Midnapore, AB]

Mr. Speaker, it is always a pleasure to stand in the House and speak on behalf of the wonderful citizens of Calgary Midnapore.

What a week this has been. First, I would like to thank the member for Durham for his leadership over the last 18 months. I am truly grateful for the leadership he provided our party and for all of the incredible opportunities he gave me. I wish him, his wife Rebecca and his beautiful children Molly and Jack, Jack who is of course the same age as my son Edward, nothing but the very best as they go forward into the future.

I would also like to welcome our incredible new leader, the fantastic individual from the riding of Portage—Lisgar. I have such incredible respect for her as a parliamentarian who has really trenched a path forward here in the House of Commons in so many roles, as a minister in the Harper administration, of course as our House leader, as our deputy leader and now as our leader. I cannot wait for her leadership to unify us as Conservatives over the coming days.

Finally, before I get to the meat of my speech, I also want to make a special recognition to a special individual in my riding. Tyler Turner, raised in the community of Sundance, who won gold for Canada, the first gold in the World Para Snow Sports Championships. I am so very proud of this individual who was born and raised in my riding of Calgary Midnapore. I also thank my constituent and supporter Dale Bradley. It is really a special moment for Calgary Midnapore.

I am now going to get into the reason I am here today, which is to respond to the fall economic statement. The story that comes to mind is a very embarrassing story for me. I was in kindergarten at Sam Livingston School in my riding, about three blocks away from where my parents, who are now my constituents, still live. I was painting, I had on my paint smock, and I was so proud of the painting I had created. When it came time for me to remove my paint smock, unfortunately, I was wearing a dress that day that had an elastic around the shoulders. Upon removing my paint smock, my very good friend Kimberlee Crocker, who lived two blocks away from me, pointed to me and said, “Stephanie, you're in your underwear.”

I had never been more embarrassed in the first five years of my life than when, in that moment, I realized I had taken off my paint smock as well as my dress. I was standing there in my underwear. If I had something to say at that moment, and this phrase had not arrived yet in the world, I would have said, “There is nothing to see here.”

We could say that same thing about the fall economic statement. There is nothing to see here. We are coming up on 24 months of the pandemic. Unfortunately, Canadians had to retreat to their homes. In many cases, they were provided funding by the government, funding we supported, in fact funding we came back to the House time and time again to support as a result of the errors of the government. Nonetheless, we were good team players. We wanted to go along with what Canadians needed at that time, so we supported the measures that were taken.

Essentially what happened was that individuals had excess funds as a result of not being able to go out. Factory workers were not in the factories producing at the time because they were following government orders. As a result, we had too few goods and too many dollars resting among citizens. The result of that was too many dollars chasing too few goods. That got us into the situation we are in with this problem of inflation.

However, there were other problems, in addition to this fundamental problem. The government did not make it any easier for us to overcome this problem. First, there was the incredible overspending that we saw from the government, the overspending that continues to this very day. Certainly, as I stated, we were good team players. We went along with what Canadians required at the time. However, the government keeps bringing up, again and again, our refusal to go along with them on Bill C-2, another $7 billion, and quite frankly, that is because we were very concerned about the amount the government had spent at that time, as well as its continued spending.

In addition, the government did not start to take immediate economic action to account for the lack of supply. I have said often that if I had been the Prime Minister, I would have begun an immediate national inventory of agriculture, minerals, energy—everything from coast to coast to coast to start to reconsider what we have and what we need.

I actually thought that the pandemic would bring us into incredible new trading patterns around the world, with less reliance on China, but nothing of that sort was done at the time. In fact, we did not even start to begin domestic production of many things, including vaccines, in a timely manner. I am sure members will remember that we shipped our personal protective equipment overseas to China. In fact, when I was in a meeting just last week, the member for Abbotsford indicated that the mask he was wearing, which had been distributed by the House of Commons, was made in China. My point is that the government did not take action to immediately address that. Again, nothing to see here.

What do we need to do now? Well, I will tell us all, and I would like to thank Mr. David Dodge and the fall economic outlook from Bennett Jones for this information.

First of all, we need to stop spending. We need to stop spending at our current rate and seriously reconsider where our dollars go and whether every dollar that is spent is necessary to spend.

In addition, only incredible productivity in our nation will save us from this rising inflation. It is one of the only things that will save us. We need to continue to incentivize production within our nation and we need to start thinking about how we are going to do that. In fact, if the government spends money at this time, it absolutely must be for some type of productivity increase in the future, not the willy-nilly spending that we have seen up to this point, and again I say that up to this point, there is nothing to see here.

I will take a moment to talk about the labour impacts. I know this aspect was brought up in question period today by my colleague from Regina—Lewvan.

There have been 200,000 jobs lost, which is nothing to sneeze at. Throughout the recent months, the government has done nothing but try to take credit for the one million jobs it says it has created. The government did not create these jobs. This has just been a natural recovery from the pandemic; it has nothing to do with the government's positive actions, not at all.

In addition to that, the government talked about 106% employment. This is also a fallacy. This number is also inflated. The workforce has been shrinking as individuals, be it through retirement or moving somewhere else, have removed themselves from the workforce. With fewer workers but the same population, there will be higher employment, so the 106% figure is also a fallacy. There is nothing to see here.

What is most shocking is that the real impacts of the Liberals' inaction are completely lost on them. We saw in the fall session that they cannot state how much a package of bacon costs. Even the non-vegetarians cannot state what they pay for a whole chicken. A year ago I paid $10 for a whole chicken; I just paid $18 at Safeway for a whole chicken.

[Some hon. members]

Oh, oh!

[Stephanie Kusie, Conservative, Calgary Midnapore, AB]

They are heckling me. That was coming from a Prime Minister who had two nannies and a Deputy Prime Minister who only knows that the GDP is increasing at 4.6%.

I have used the phrase “nothing to see here” in a double sense. The government is trying to hide what it has not done; as well, I am indicating that no action has been taken. My point is that both are bad and neither is good, but it does not change the fact that there is nothing to see here.

[Adam van Koeverden, Liberal, Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister of Health and to the Minister of Sport]

Mr. Speaker, I was amused, as I think everybody in the House was, to hear the funny anecdote about kindergarten. I really do struggle to see what relevance the story had to the conversation around Bill C-8, which certainly does have quite a lot in it.

I am sure you have read the bill. You say there is just nothing to see here, so I will read a quote, because I have heard the member speak about the importance of the arts: “Nice to see $60 million identified to support workers and the arts. The live performance industry has been struggling hard during COVID and we haven't seen nearly the same support that tourism and restaurants have, so they were really, really grateful for that support.”

Is the member opposite not happy to see some support for the arts and many, many other things, given that she must have read the bill before standing up today?

[The Deputy Speaker, Conservative, Chris d'Entremont]

I will remind the member, though he did correct himself in the end, to direct questions through the Chair and not to address someone directly as “you”.

The hon. member for Calgary Midnapore.

[Stephanie Kusie, Conservative, Calgary Midnapore, AB]

Mr. Speaker, it is not surprising at all that a Liberal member of the House would take a story that is so personal to me, where I felt so much pain and embarrassment in my life, and try to make fun of it. He did not even try to relate to it and say he had something similar in his life. He is even laughing at me now.

This is not surprising. I certainly would not expect these members to understand economics, much less be able to have the simple human relation of an embarrassing moment, which I am sure everyone in the House has faced.

[Daniel Blaikie, NDP, Elmwood—Transcona, MB]

Mr. Speaker, one of the things Canadians are contending with right now is massive increases in price in the housing market. In debate previously on Bill C-8, I heard a Conservative colleague of the member say that there really was not a need to see governments build more social housing units and that what was needed was to tackle the problem of money laundering. Certainly, we do need to tackle the problem of money laundering, but I think most Canadians expect that government will have to do substantially more and that the problems in the housing market are not simply a function of money laundering.

I am wondering if we could hear from the member some concrete proposals for what she believes government ought to be doing to tackle the issues in the housing market, which I would note predate the pandemic and the current government. Real estate prices have been having astronomical increases for some time now. What can government do in order to get a handle on the situation?

[Stephanie Kusie, Conservative, Calgary Midnapore, AB]

Mr. Speaker, I do have some concrete proposals, believe it or not.

First of all, the government can stop directing its benefits to those who money launder and those who buy arms with these funds. That would be a great start. If it could get some accountability within the benefits that it distributes, that would be a fantastic start.

Second, I think the best way to have a good housing economy is to have a good economy. When people have good jobs and are not overwhelmed by the price of groceries and gas, they can actually start to save money for homes. I think that is a fantastic thing. I will also add that we had a fantastic housing initiative put together by my colleague in our platform this last election. I really think the Liberal government should go back to our platform and review that housing strategy in an effort to move forward, because what they are doing is not working.