Debates of Nov. 7th, 2023

Opposition Motion—Reducing Home Heating Costs

[The Assistant Deputy Speaker, NDP, Carol Hughes]

It is my duty to inform hon. members that an amendment to an opposition motion may be moved only with the consent of the sponsor of the motion or, in the case that he or she is not present, consent may be given or denied by the House leader, the deputy House leader, the whip or the deputy whip of the sponsor's party.

The hon. member for North Island—Powell River.

[Rachel Blaney, NDP, North Island—Powell River, BC]

Madam Speaker, we do not accept it.

[The Assistant Deputy Speaker, NDP, Carol Hughes]

There is no consent. Therefore, pursuant to Standing Order 85, the amendment cannot be moved at this time.

[Leah Gazan, NDP, Winnipeg Centre, MB]

Madam Speaker, I would like to thank the corporate champion of Carleton for his comments.

The Conservative government in the U.K. has put in place a windfall tax on oil and gas companies. Will the Leader of the Opposition support our plan for a windfall tax so that we can invest that money to give working people a break on their energy bills, or is he too afraid to axe the profits of his oil and gas buddies, and CEOs?

[Pierre Poilievre, Conservative, Carleton, ON]

Madam Speaker, first of all, let us just acknowledge what happened here. The NDP has flip-flopped again.

For the last eight years, its members have supported the Prime Minister's plan to quadruple the tax on home heating and then, under relentless pressure from common-sense Conservatives, yesterday, they flip-flopped and admitted they were wrong all along. Then today, they flip-flopped again and said that they now support a carbon tax on home heating for some.

The coalition is reunited, and all three of them are together now: the separatists, the socialists and the Prime Minister. The costly coalition is bankrupting the people. The only solution is a common-sense Conservative government that will axe the tax.

[Steven MacKinnon, Liberal, Gatineau, QC]

Madam Speaker, when it comes to flip-flopping in the House, the Leader of the Opposition should feel right at home. He has been here since God knows when, but in 2008, he ran under Stephen Harper and promised to put a price on pollution. In 2019 and 2021, he ran under Erin O'Toole and swore to his constituents that he would put a price on carbon. All the Conservatives did.

Say what we like about flip-flopping, but the opposition leader has done his share. When did he change his mind? Was he misleading people back then, or is he misleading them now?

[Pierre Poilievre, Conservative, Carleton, ON]

Madam Speaker, I have always opposed the carbon tax. When I began my career, Liberal lobbyists were all over Parliament Hill, asking for more taxes and other benefits for Liberal friends. That member is an example of the lobbying industry that exists on the Hill, one that favours the Prime Minister's pals and is costly to ordinary Canadians.

After eight years of this Prime Minister, he is not worth the cost. He acknowledged this by giving some people a break on the carbon tax, in ridings where he is slumping in the polls and where Liberal members were rebelling. Now we are simply saying that everyone should get a break.

It is just until the next election at which time we can have a carbon tax election to choose between the Liberal-NDP-Bloc plan to quadruple the tax and my common-sense plan to axe the tax and bring home lower prices.

[Mark Gerretsen, Liberal, Kingston and the Islands, ON]

Madam Speaker, I rise on a point of order. The Leader of the Opposition referred to the member for Gatineau as a former lobbyist. He has never been a lobbyist. Maybe the member wants to retract that.

[The Assistant Deputy Speaker, NDP, Carol Hughes]

That is a point of debate.

Questions and comments, the member for Trois-Rivières.

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

Madam Speaker, I thank the Leader of the Opposition for his insults.

I do not know what he read in La Presse recently. He and I must have read different things. Earlier I heard all kinds of falsehoods, jokes, smears, deceptions, hypocrisies, fantasies, inventions, fabrications and trickery. In all of this, I heard nothing about what was in the La Presse article he referred to. I wonder if he could enlighten me on that first.

Second, I would like him to define “common sense” for me. Rather than turning it into an empty slogan, I would like him to explain what he really means, philosophically, when he says “common sense”.

[Pierre Poilievre, Conservative, Carleton, ON]

Madam Speaker, common sense is getting rid of the carbon tax to lower prices. Common sense is lowering taxes to make work pay again. Common sense is cutting red tape to make it possible to build more affordable housing for Canadians. Common sense is balancing the budget to reduce inflation and interest rates.

Common sense means that Quebeckers are free to earn large paycheques to be able to buy food, fuel and affordable homes in safe communities.

That is common sense.

[Yves Perron, Bloc, Berthier—Maskinongé, QC]

Madam Speaker, there is a strange atmosphere in here. There are two extremes in the House, both of which are panicking over the polls. In fact, I could even say there are three extremes.

The government is starting to make last-minute decisions in a panic. If there is one point on which I could agree with the Conservatives, it is that panic has gripped the government, spurring it to make poor decisions, such as last week's announcement. The parties are caught in what I will call populism, meaning that they propose any old thing and toss slogans around. The Bloc Québécois just saw the proof once again. We asked for an explanation, but we received a string of slogans by way of an answer. No doubt they will make great sound bites, but they ring hollow.

I will talk about the absence of truth, the trick that certain political parties have of proposing any old thing to the House, not for the purpose of benefiting the common good or helping the citizens of Quebec and Canada, but for the purpose of scoring points. How do they score these political points? They move a motion that they know the other political parties cannot support because it contains measures that are unreasonable. Then they can reproach the other parties for not adopting the motion.

I will therefore continue my speech along this emotional path, especially since it threw me earlier, Madam Speaker, when you confused my riding with that of another member. My colleague from Trois-Rivières is very smart, likeable and charismatic, so I will take this as a compliment. However, I do not think he is quite as handsome as me, so I am a little irked. All joking aside, I should clarify, since I forgot to do it earlier, that I will be sharing my time with my colleague from Trois-Rivières, for whom I have the utmost affection, of course.

Once again, the motion presented to the House does not make sense. The basic idea is not bad. However, as is often the case with measures proposed by the NDP, either the math does not add up or Quebec's jurisdictions are disrespected. It is always one or the other. One need only consider the pan-Canadian pharmacare plan. The Bloc agrees with it in principle. We are not here to harm Canada. However, when we ask them to put in writing that Quebec would have the right to opt out, they refuse to do so. We are therefore forced to vote against the pharmacare plan, because we want to protect Quebec. Then we are accused of not wanting pharmacare.

It is the same thing with the Conservatives. They are accusing us—oh, the irony—of having voted for a second carbon tax. I heard it yesterday and again today from the Leader of the Opposition. That was never put to a vote, however. Their so-called second carbon tax, this falsehood that Conservatives like to repeat all over the media and every other forum, is a regulation that was adopted by the government. We never voted on this regulation which, just like the first carbon tax, does not apply in Quebec because Quebec already has an equivalent regulation in place. Quebec's regulation is actually more stringent. This regulation has no effect on Quebec, but Conservatives repeat all day long that it does and that the Bloc Québécois voted for it. If that is not lying, I do not know what is.

I want to come back to the NDP's motion. They are talking about giving people a chance. We are on board with that. However, the Bloc Québécois believes in energy equity, or in other words, we believe that efforts must be made to prevent global warming while helping low-income people. That is what we should be doing, but it is not what the NDP is proposing in its motion. I hope that the NDP's intentions are nobler than the Conservatives'. I hope that the NPD does not intend to simply say tomorrow that the Bloc voted against their motion, because that would be very disappointing. That may happen. We will see. We will then know what to expect in the future.

The big problem with the NDP's motion is that it does not look at how much this measure will cost or fully consider where the money for implementing it will come from. Putting a tax on the excessive profits of oil companies seems like a good idea. According to the Parliamentary Budget Officer's estimates, that would generate about $1 billion per year. My colleague from Rosemont—La Petite-Patrie even pointed that out earlier. However, the proposed measures would cost $4.5 billion per year for the GST and even more for the heat pumps. The NPD wants to give everyone a free heat pump.

See how sensitive, tricky and also a little dishonest that is?

They are nice; they want to help Canadians. They want to give everyone heat pumps, but that is not realistic. I, too, would love to give everyone a heat pump. I would like that. Earlier, my colleague was more reasonable than I was. She tried to temper things by saying that various factors could lower the price tag and it might be about $77 billion. However, according to the figures I have, it could be closer to $100 billion. That is significant. That is a major measure. It is not that we are against heat pumps, but this just does not make sense.

That is the sad thing about all this. I dream of a time when MPs will work together, presenting reasonable measures for the common good. We are presented with measures that make no sense, and then, tomorrow, we will be criticized for voting against them. I find it very difficult to deal with this kind of populist dishonesty on a daily basis in the House. It is all about scoring points and making a good impression. The motion we are considering seems to indicate that the NDP is seeing that the polls are changing and they are in a bit of a panic. They want to show that they, too, want to eliminate taxes. That is what we are seeing today.

I will go over the proposal briefly, starting with removing the GST from residential heating. I am not saying that is a bad idea or one not worth looking at, but how do we distinguish electricity used for heating from that used for everything else in Quebec when more than 80% of Quebeckers have electric heat? How is that going to be adjusted with respect to people in western Canada and the Atlantic provinces who heat with oil?

They use electricity too, but their power bills will not be adjusted, while their heating oil cost will. That means rewarding fossil fuel use. Do people still want to promote fossil fuels? Some things do not work. As I said, this measure would be very expensive.

The funniest, most bizarre measure—I am not sure how else to describe it—is giving everyone a free heat pump, including people in the middle class. It looks like they want to give free heat pumps to a whole lot of people. What is the plan for compensating people who are already installing one? What is the plan for making sure that businesses that do this kind of work can keep up with demand? I predict the price of heat pumps will skyrocket in the next two months. That is pretty clear.

How is the government going to balance the books then? We often hear people say that we have to balance the budget. A measure that costs about $100 billion is huge. With that kind of measure, how are we helping people living on low and modest incomes?

As someone mentioned earlier, does that mean that people whose heating costs are included in their rent get nothing? Will landlords already charging high rents receive a tax credit? Will people living in 28-room luxury homes be exempt from paying tax on the heating for their huge mansions?

Parties have to think before proposing measures. I want to stress that I am a moderate and reasonable person. I understand the basic intention. The parties want to do something, but they are coming up with wild solutions knowing full well that almost no one will vote for them because nothing balances at the end of the month. Then they will call us out for refusing to help people.

Meanwhile, the Bloc Québécois is looking for support regarding subsidies for oil companies, for example. We have been talking a lot about how much they are making, because their profits are ridiculous. Not only are they making profits, but by 2035, it is expected that the Canadian government will have given them $83 billion in subsidies. That is a lot of money that could go toward heat pumps. Could those subsidies be eliminated so old age pensions could be increased starting at age 65 for people who need them to buy groceries and pay their bills? Could we be reasonable and sit down to talk about how we could establish credits to help low-income people, people who need support or who need assistance because they have a large family so it is hard to put food on the table?

We should be focusing on things like this, in other words, specific, concrete things that affect people's daily lives, without resorting to disgusting populism and creating sound bites to smear other political parties.

I am sick of that. I want to work on behalf of Quebeckers.

[Mark Gerretsen, Liberal, Kingston and the Islands, ON]

Mr. Speaker, the hon. Bloc member brought up a lot of points that are similar to my points.

Could the member perhaps explain some of the policies currently existing in Quebec that are really encouraging people to move toward cleaner options? We know that Quebec has a long history of this. Quebec recently announced that it is illegal to install forms of oil heating in homes, and soon it will be illegal to even install any new fossil fuel-burning heating options.

Quebec has genuinely been a leader in affordable electricity for the province. What can the member share that the rest of the country could benefit from?

[Yves Perron, Bloc, Berthier—Maskinongé, QC]

Mr. Speaker, I thank my colleague for his generous question and for helping me answer it, because he supplied half the response before giving me the floor.

Indeed, Quebec has always been a leader. We saw that with child care. It took 25 years for Canada to get on board. I hope that Canada will get on board when it comes to energy as well.

Quebec helps people install more efficient heating systems, such as heat pumps, through the Rénoclimat program. A preliminary assessment is done of the homes. It is all well regulated. The program is geared to people who need help the most.

What could Canada recognize about Quebec? It could recognize the way we want to live and run our own affairs. Maybe it should just let us be. It may have better luck that way, if it wants to keep us. For now, what we want is to run our own affairs.

[Anna Roberts, Conservative, King—Vaughan, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I would like to ask my hon. colleague a question.

There is a 70-year-old grandmother in Newfoundland who cannot afford to eat or heat her home. She has had to go out and get a second job to support her family. How is the carbon tax going to help this individual?

If seniors matter, why is the Quebec caucus voting with the Liberal government and not with Conservatives for common-sense solutions? Could the member explain this to me?

[Yves Perron, Bloc, Berthier—Maskinongé, QC]

Mr. Speaker, I will try to make this quick. There was a lot to her question.

First of all, the carbon tax does not apply in Quebec. I have said it many times. I would like her party to get that through their heads. It is an important detail. That is why we voted against the Conservative motion yesterday. We did not want to create an imbalance between people in this country. There are ways to help people.

Second, my colleague is talking to me about a 70-year-old woman. I just spoke about old age pensions starting at age 65. Her party always used to express support for our idea of increasing the old age pension starting at age 65, but since the arrival of the new leader, we are no longer hearing any support from them. Now, this member has the nerve to talk to me about a 70-year-old woman who is struggling to make ends meet. I am trying not to get angry, but sometimes it is difficult.

[Randall Garrison, NDP, Esquimalt—Saanich—Sooke, BC]

Mr. Speaker, I listened with interest to the Bloc member's comments. I thought I heard a couple of red herrings in there.

One concern that the Liberals also raised is about how there might be some wealthy person in Canada who would benefit from having GST removed from their home heating. I am not really concerned about that, as long as they pay their taxes. The other one is the high cost of these programs.

Would the member support an excess profit tax on the oil and gas companies to help pay for things so that others can afford their heating and get off fossil fuels?

[Yves Perron, Bloc, Berthier—Maskinongé, QC]

Mr. Speaker, I thank my colleague for his smart, well-articulated question. How refreshing.

We could study his proposal. I said earlier that there is a major issue with the oil companies. Essentially, for years, the Bloc Québécois has been very vocal in every one of its speeches in the House about starting by ending the subsidies for the oil companies. They will have gotten $83 billion by 2035. It makes no sense.

Yes, we can look at the proposal. We are open to all proposals. We will study all of them.

However, we have to be smart about imposing taxes. We need to avoid price increases. Unfortunately and far too often, the oil industry passes the cost on to the consumer, who is trapped, while the industry continues to make record profits.

I think the government needs to stop subsidizing the industry.

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

Mr. Speaker, I want to start by extending my heartfelt greetings to my constituents in Trois-Rivières, who often contact me about the precarious state of the French language and about immigration. It cannot be said often enough that the latest Official Languages Act is nothing but a bilingualism legislation that is not in Quebec's favour. We need to remember that.

Today's debate is on an NDP motion to remove the GST from home heating. Let us analyze the motion a little deeper. It states that “2023 saw a record fire season due to climate change”. That is a fact, sadly. The motion also mentions that “Canadians continue to struggle with dramatic increases to the cost of living while Canada’s biggest corporations, including oil and gas corporations, post record profits”. That is also a fact. However, the NDP mentions neither banks, who are in the same situation, nor their hobby horse, grocery stores. The motion also mentions “federal government programs aimed at supporting energy efficient retrofits” that are “hard to access”. That part of the motion is somewhat interpretive. I will go through the motion item by item.

At first glance, the motion seems to be talking about social justice and equity. It seems as though the intention of this motion is to provide help to those who need it most, which is keeping with the NDP's usual stance. However, sometimes we need to pay closer attention to determine whether the measures that are actually going to be implemented are consistent with the stated intention. Let me explain.

I will give an example from the business world, because that is what I am familiar with. Over the past 20 years, in the business community, we have been hearing a lot of managerial discourse designed to motivate employees or take advantage of them, as the case may be. Employers have been talking about responsibility when what they mean is accountability. Everyone has been talking about kindness, but it does not mean anything to anyone. Employers have been talking about team work, when employees are actually in competition. People often use big words—and the Leader of the Opposition is an expert in that area—without any real understanding of what those words actually mean.

I would remind my colleagues, who are always happy to hear it, that a word is a construct of sound and meaning. Sometimes the sound changes the meaning, and we can be misled by that. As the saying goes, the end justifies the means. In recent years, we have noticed that people have often been confusing the ends and the means. They think that the means are the ends, which is an error of judgment. When members say that the carbon tax is an end, that is an error of judgment. The carbon tax is simply a means.

Getting back to the NDP motion, it seems noble on the surface. Who would not want to help the least fortunate? Is that really what this is about, though? I was surprised to see a motion like this up for debate this week at this point in the session. For some time now, we have been witnessing the Liberal government in turmoil. It does not know if it is coming or going with its flagship carbon tax initiative. First it says it will apply the tax. Then it says it will not. Then it says it will apply it on some things, but not on others. As the classic song goes, the Liberal government's internal dialogue is basically, “Should I stay or should I go?”

I would even go so far as to say that, in its confusion, the government is dragging its confidence and supply agreement partner down with it. I can see how desperately the NDP is trying to distinguish itself from the Liberals. Removing the GST from heating is not necessarily a bad thing in and of itself, but it has nothing to do with the carbon tax.

Measures already exist for heat pumps and alternative heating systems. Quebec talks about energy equity. There are actually numerous other options. At the end of the day, who is going to pay for heat pumps? It is typical of the NDP to continually ask for measures without concerning themselves with how they will be financed. Funding programs requires revenue, and that revenue usually comes from taxes. We have to be careful. I know that the New Democrats are in favour of taxing oil companies, but let us not confuse reality with obsession. Who will pay for heat pumps? The oil companies, of course.

That will mean more investments in oil so that oil companies can finance the heat pumps in question. This seems to me to be the antithesis of the NDP's usual position.

The NDP likes to say it will tax profits. I am not against that. However, profits exist for a reason. Take a risk and sometimes that risk is rewarded. Taxing excess profits is fine, but we need a definition of “excess”.

Basically, when we talk about helping the most disadvantaged, we are talking about equity. Equity, when defined, is a fair assessment of what each person is entitled to. What are lower-income families entitled to? What are the people entitled to when they benefit from the GST credit because heating is included in the rent? That could be troublesome.

I would like to propose that we act according to what is right, or social justice, in other words, that we do the right thing at the right time, in the right way and for the right reasons. I do not think that is what is happening here. Honestly, I believe that the stated intention of helping the less fortunate is nothing more than a smokescreen for the NDP's veiled attempt to hold on to votes or win votes as it goes through challenging times. Passing the NDP motion would be a mistake, if not a failure. For the NDP, it would amount to a subtle betrayal of its own principles.

In light of the various arguments and given my conviction that its purported purpose is not directly related to its concealed aim or stated intention, the Bloc Québécois will vote against the NDP motion.

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

Mr. Speaker, I want to go back to yesterday's motion. I think today's motion reflects, in good part, what took place with the vote yesterday.

One thing that is getting lost in this debate is the issue of the environment and the valuable role that heat pumps will play going forward. It is easy to say that we should get rid of this tax or that tax and so forth, but it overshadows the importance of good, solid government policy on heat pumps. Could the member share his thoughts on that?

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

Mr. Speaker, as always, the question from my colleague opposite is relevant.

I have not taken a position against the tax. I do not want to leave any room for confusion here. I also did not say that heat pumps are useless. I said that heat pumps still need financing and that the tax, in its current form, will not be affected by a goods and services tax reduction. I therefore did not take a position on whether the tax is relevant or not, but rather on the measure used to mitigate its impact.

I do not believe it will achieve the desired effect.

[Rachel Blaney, NDP, North Island—Powell River, BC]

Mr. Speaker, I was a little confused by the member's speech, and I hope I can get some clarity.

The member talked a lot about social justice and its impact. From his speech, I wonder if he understands the correlation between economic justice and social justice and how, so often, the lowest-income people are the ones working the hardest to make ends meet while the very wealthy CEOs are making money off their backs. Does he think those two things need to be dealt with if we are going to be proud of this country we call Canada?

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

Mr. Speaker, my colleague will be happy to hear that I completely agree with her on that. However, I do not believe that the proposed measures will achieve the desired outcome or stated intent. I agree with the purpose, but I do not believe that these measures are the best way to achieve it.

[Yves Perron, Bloc, Berthier—Maskinongé, QC]

Mr. Speaker, I thank my colleague for his brilliant speech.

I am going to do something I do not normally do and talk about a family member. In a few minutes, my sister-in-law Carole will be going to an extremely important medical appointment. I want her to know that she has always been there for me and I will always be there for her. She can count on my support.

My question for my colleague relates to what I just said. It is about being there for others. Could my colleague explain what the role of a member of Parliament is? It is about being there for our constituents.

Is it to move motions that we know will not be adopted, simply to score political points, or is it something else? I would like him to explain what “something else” might mean.

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

Mr. Speaker, I thank my brilliant colleague from Berthier—Maskinongé for his always relevant questions. I will keep his sister-in-law Carole in my thoughts.

Being there for people is a good thing. It is the essence of an MP's job. Our constituents delegated responsibility to us so that we could act for them in Parliament. We have to be there for our constituents. We have to be there for the public.

Electoral considerations will never be entirely absent, of course. However, electoral considerations should be front and centre during election campaigns, not during a session, when we should be there to help the less fortunate and, as my colleague who spoke before me was saying, to reconcile social and economic justice.