Debates of Feb. 14th, 2023

Foreign Affairs and International Development

[Ali Ehsassi, Liberal, Willowdale, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I have the honour to present, in both official languages, the following two reports of the Standing Committee on Foreign Affairs and International Development: the ninth report, entitled “The 2002 Extreme Flooding in Pakistan: Saving Lives and Supporting a Climate-Resilient Recovery”, and the 10th report, entitled “The Russian State's Illegal War of Aggression Against Ukraine”.

Pursuant to Standing Order 109, the committee requests that the government table a comprehensive response to each of these two reports.

[Garnett Genuis, Conservative, Sherwood Park—Fort Saskatchewan, AB]

Mr. Speaker, I have a supplementary opinion to the second report mentioned with respect to Ukraine.

The Conservatives are pleased to fully endorse the main committee's report. Our supplementary opinion identifies three areas where we wish to go further in supporting international peace and security. These areas are as follows: contributing to global energy security and food security, combatting foreign interference and recognizing the failure of the Gazprom turbine policy.

The Conservatives believe that Canada should be expediting key energy projects to support global fuel and food security and countering dependence on Russia by fellow democracies. Not nearly enough is being done to combat foreign state-backed interference by the Russian state, but also by other actors. While the main report acknowledges that ending the Gazprom turbine waiver was a good step, we believe that granting the turbine waiver in the first place was a grave mistake and a betrayal of the Ukrainian cause. Canada must be resolute in its support for Ukraine, including through the consistent application of sanctions.

Public Accounts

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

Mr. Speaker, I have the honour to present, in both official languages, two reports from the Standing Committee on Public Accounts. The first is the 25th report, entitled “Processing Disability Benefits for Veterans”.

The second is the 26th report, entitled “Greening Government Strategy”.

I believe we will hear from the hon. member for Edmonton West, who has two dissenting reports to table immediately after me.

Pursuant to Standing Order 109, the committee requests that the government table a comprehensive response to each of these two reports.

[Kelly McCauley, Conservative, Edmonton West, AB]

Mr. Speaker, I rise to table two dissenting reports.

The first one is on the Auditor General's report on processing disability benefits for veterans. The Auditor General's report shows that Veterans Affairs is in crisis. At the time of the audit, the median wait time for processing for veterans was 39 weeks. The standard is 16 weeks. Despite achieving just 13% of annual targets, Veterans Affairs paid out bonuses to 98% of their management executives.

We table this report with two recommendations: first, that Veterans Affairs study the effects of automation to improve the service time for veterans' disability benefits; and second, that the performance, at-risk and bonus compensation for Veterans Affairs executives be withheld until such time as backlogs of disability benefit claims have been cleared and the department's service standard target for assessing future applications is consistently met.

The second dissenting report is on the “Greening Government Strategy” report. The Auditor General, in her report, states the government has provided the worst GHG emissions outcomes in the entire G7. Furthermore, the report states that Treasury Board rules require that the department sign off on the integrity of its GHG emissions. Seventy-five per cent of the departments, including the Department of Environment, refused to sign off on integrity, showing that their emission results are much like their environmental plan, which is a sham.

We therefore submit three recommendations: first, that the Treasury Board Secretariat ensure that all departments follow the rules and that the assistant deputy ministers sign off on the integrity of their mission data; second, that the Treasury Board provide clear, transparent projections of costs to the Canadian taxpayers to achieve net-zero by 2050; and finally, that all federal department plans to reach net-zero emissions by 2050 be based on existing technology and policies to accurately monitor, evaluate and communicate the performance of each department in reducing GHG emissions.

Canada Pension Plan Investment Board Act

[Alistair MacGregor, NDP, Cowichan—Malahat—Langford, BC]

moved for leave to introduce Bill C-315, An Act to amend the Canada Pension Plan Investment Board Act (investments).

Mr. Speaker, I am very pleased and honoured to rise in the House today to introduce my private member's bill, which would amend the investment policy standards and procedures of the Canada Pension Plan Investment Board to ensure that no CPP funds are invested in any entity that has committed human, labour or environmental rights violations. My bill would also ensure pension funds are not invested in any arms or munitions of war prohibited under international law or in any company guilty of corruption.

The Canada Pension Plan Investment Board manages over $500 billion in assets, and it is mandated to invest in the best interests of CPP contributors and beneficiaries by maximizing returns without undue risk of loss. It is important to note that my bill would not change this mandate. The Canada pension plan is an important part of our retirement system, but Canadians expect that its investments are not contributing to human misery around the world. By amending section 35 of the Canada Pension Plan Investment Board Act to specify human, labour and environmental rights considerations, this bill would do just that.

I would like to thank the incredible member for New Westminster—Burnaby for seconding this bill.

(Motions deemed adopted, bill read the first time and printed)

Firearms

[Alex Ruff, Conservative, Bruce—Grey—Owen Sound, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I am presenting a petition on behalf of a number of my constituents, in particular law-abiding firearms owners. There are two aspects to the petition. The petitioners are calling on the government to drop the last-minute amendments to Bill C-21, which I note has occurred, and in particular to focus on criminals and not law-abiding firearms owners.

The petitioners emphasize the requirement for the government to use its own data, in particular Public Safety's commissioned report done a few years back by Hill+Knowlton. It points out that over 100,000 Canadians oppose a firearms ban in this country.

The petitioners are calling upon the government to stand up for law-abiding firearms owners, sport shooters and farmers with gun legislation, quit targeting them and go after criminals instead.

Intimate Partner Violence

[Adam Chambers, Conservative, Simcoe North, ON]

Mr. Speaker, it is a pleasure to rise today to present a petition sponsored by The Canadian Federation of University Women's chapter in Orillia. It relates to a very important issue: domestic partner violence.

Four in 10 women and one third of men have experienced some form of intimate partner violence. In fact, in 2018, 44% of women, or about 6.2 million women aged 15 and over, reported experiencing some kind of physical, psychological or sexual abuse in the context of an intimate relationship in their lifetime. Almost a third of all police-reported violent crimes in Canada are calls involving intimate partner violence. Of all partners charged with intimate partner assault, 50% violate their bail conditions and at least 25% commit further crimes. In fact, in 2020, 160 women were killed by violence in Canada, which equals one woman or girl every 2.5 days.

The petition calls on the government to make important judicial reforms, including to only grant bail for first-time alleged IPV offenders who have not violated any previous bail conditions, have not committed a weapons-related offence and have not demonstrated a coercive control pattern of behaviour over a victim; to make it a legal duty to inform the offender's victims immediately about the exact time, day and location of the bail hearing and ensure safety concerns are submitted to the bail hearing; and if bail is granted, to make it a legal duty to require that a repeat or high-risk accused individual wear a GPS tracking device to strengthen the effectiveness of the restraining order.

Expanded Polystyrene

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

Madam Speaker, I am honoured to table a petition from 88 folks in Delta, Port Coquitlam and North Vancouver who are expressing a lot of concern about expanded polystyrene and the impact it has on the environment, especially, of course, the marine environment.

The petitioners note that there is significant harm to marine life, seafood resources and ecosystems when it is added to the system. It is difficult if not impossible to clean up the shorelines after it breaks down, and it has a very high likelihood of entering the marine environment from damaged marine infrastructure, whether it is encased or not.

The petitioners are asking the Government of Canada to prohibit the use of expanded polystyrene in the marine environment.

Health Care

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

Madam Speaker, it is a pleasure to table today a petition signed by the residents of Winnipeg North with respect to the Canada Health Act. They make reference to the fact that the Canada Health Act sets out a framework to ensure that we have a true national health care system from coast to coast to coast.

The petitioners are asking governments of different levels to work together to ensure that issues are dealt with, to broaden health care responsibilities, to take into consideration mental health and long-term care and to continue on the path set out for dental care, pharmacare and issues of that nature.

I am sure the petitioners were quite happy to see that we just recently made a $198-billion commitment over the next 10 years to build upon the national health care system.

Corporate Social Responsibility

[Alistair MacGregor, NDP, Cowichan—Malahat—Langford, BC]

Madam Speaker, I am pleased to present a petition today from petitioners recognizing that some companies based in Canada are contributing to human rights abuse and environmental damage around the world, and that the people who protest the abuses and defend their rights are often harassed, attacked or killed, especially indigenous people, women and marginalized groups.

The petitioners are calling upon the House of Commons to adopt human rights and environmental due diligence legislation that would require companies to prevent adverse human rights impacts and environmental damage throughout their global operations and supply chains, that would result in meaningful consequences for companies that fail to carry out and report on adequate due diligence and that would establish, importantly, a legal right for people who have been harmed to seek justice in Canadian courts.

Questions on the Order Paper

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

Madam Speaker, I ask that all questions be allowed to stand at this time.

[The Assistant Deputy Speaker, NDP, Carol Hughes]

Is that agreed?

[Some hon. members]

Agreed.

[The Assistant Deputy Speaker, NDP, Carol Hughes]

Before I go to orders of the day, I want to wish everyone a happy Valentine's Day.

Opposition Motion—Rising Inflation and Cost of Living

[Jasraj Singh Hallan, Conservative, Calgary Forest Lawn, AB]

moved:

That, given that,

(i) after eight years of this Liberal Prime Minister, inflation is at a 40-year high,

(ii) after eight years of this Liberal Prime Minister, the cost of groceries is up 11%,

(iii) after eight years of this Liberal Prime Minister, half of Canadians are cutting back on groceries,

(iv) after eight years of this Liberal Prime Minister, 20% of Canadians are skipping meals,

(v) after eight years of this Liberal Prime Minister, the average rent for a two-bedroom apartment across Canada’s 10 biggest cities is $2,213 per month, compared to $1,171 per month in 2015,

(vi) after eight years of this Liberal Prime Minister, 45% of variable rate mortgage holders say they will have to sell or vacate their homes in less than nine months due to current interest rate levels,

(vii) after eight years of this Liberal Prime Minister, average monthly mortgage costs have more than doubled and now cost Canadians over $3,000 per month,

(viii) the Governor of the Bank of Canada, Tiff Macklem, has said that “inflation in Canada increasingly reflects what’s happening in Canada”,

(ix) the former Governor of the Bank of Canada, Mark Carney, has said: “But really now inflation is principally a domestic story”,

(x) former Liberal finance minister, Bill Morneau, has said that the government probably spent too much during COVID,

(xi) former Liberal Deputy Prime Minister and Finance Minister, John Manley, said that the Liberal Prime Minister’s fiscal policy is making it harder to contain inflation,

the House call on the government to cap spending, cut waste, fire high-priced consultants and eliminate inflationary deficits and taxes that have caused a cost-of-living crisis for Canadians.

Madam Speaker, Biggie Smalls once said, “Mo Money Mo Problems”. With the Liberal government, it seems like the more the Liberals tax, spend and waste Canadians' money, the more problems Canadians have.

After eight years of the incompetent Liberal government and its economic mismanagement, Canadians are feeling the pain. A 40-year high in inflation, high interest rates, and tripling taxes have led to Canadians running out of money.

Even before COVID hit Canada, the Prime Minister was spending record amounts on consultants and his Liberal insider friends. On top of all that, there was $100 billion in deficit spending. Of course, the spending has never ended. During COVID, the government felt good about adding half a trillion to the national debt, 40% of which had nothing to do with COVID spending.

We know now that the Prime Minister's nearly $700-billion spending spree has been more about helping insiders than actually supporting Canadians. Instead of making life better, the Prime Minister spends $15 billion a year on high-priced consultants with whom he has personal connections. Lucrative contracts have gone to companies like SNC-Lavalin and the WE Charity, as well as a company run by former Liberal MP Frank Baylis. He flushed Canadians' money down the toilet each time just to make his friends richer.

The Auditor General has even reported that $32 billion went to subsidizing criminals, foreign nationals and even dead people. Will the government get Canadians' tax dollars back from the people who should not have gotten them? Of course not. Is it going to be knocking on those coffins or tombstones to ask for the money back? The CRA seems more interested in going after law-abiding, living, breathing Canadians than Liberal-friendly corporations and criminals.

No wonder everything feels broken in this country today. Even our health care, airports and trains are a mess, and standard government services like passports or immigration are so backlogged it will take years to undo the damage once the Conservatives take over.

The cost-of-living crisis in this country is only getting worse. Inflation remains three times higher than the Bank of Canada's 2% target. Grocery prices are inflating by 11% every single month, and Canadians cannot afford home heating even if they can afford a home.

The fiscal policies of the Liberal government have left Canadians in a hole. The Prime Minister, who admits he does not think about monetary policy, is clearly not thinking of fiscal policy either. The result of hundreds of billions of dollars being added to the national debt is that the government has created inflation, which has taken the money out of everyday Canadians' pockets. It has taken the food out of Canadians' mouths and the roof from over their head, and the possibility of retirement is now just a dream. Now one in five Canadians is out of money, skipping meals, or accessing charities for help just for basic necessities; 60% of Canadians are cutting back on groceries, while 41% are looking for cheaper, less nutritious options.

Even if people can get their grocery bill down, the Liberal government's inflation is making everything else expensive. The average rent for a two-bedroom apartment across Canada's 10 biggest cities is $2,213 a month, compared to $1,171 a month in 2015. That is an almost 90% increase in rent. One of the issues complicating the price of renting is the need for more supply. Inflation has made the price of building housing units substantially more expensive while increasing red tape and taxes, disincentivizing builders from creating much-needed units.

Canada is becoming a nation of renters. According to RBC, the number of renters has increased at three times the rate of the number of homeowners in just the past 10 years. It is not only young Canadians who are increasingly turning to rent. The shift to renting is across age groups and geographic areas. RBC is projecting that the rapid growth in renters is not going to slow down, and it is clear that the home affordability crisis plays a significant role in that. The number of new homes completed in a year has increased only by 13% from 2015 to 2022.

I am glad to share my time with the great member for Simcoe North.

The Canada Mortgage and Housing Corporation says that if the current rates of new construction continue, housing supply will increase only by 2.3 million units between 2021 and 2030. CMHC projects that Canada must construct an additional 3.5 million units by 2030 to restore house price affordability.

What is most concerning to me is the lack of understanding that the government has of Canada's housing supply crisis. Instead, the Liberals continue to blame other factors or people for their own failures. We do not import land, workers or many of the supplies needed to build a house. I was in the homebuilding industry before coming to this place. I know first-hand that houses can be built using Canadian lumber, metal and workers. Russia, Ukraine and China do not play a part in that, yet house prices have doubled and Canada has the fifth-biggest housing bubble.

While home prices have come down from the crazy highs of last year, they are still significantly higher than prepandemic levels. The government's solution is to give tax credits and handouts, which do not address the housing supply issue, and provide more money to drive home prices. Even if homebuilders can meet the need for 5.8 million new units by 2030, Canadians still face high mortgage costs and diminished purchasing power.

Inflation has decimated paycheques and for first-time homebuyers, paying for a new home is daunting. As of 2021, Canadians would have to spend over half of their disposable income to purchase a home, and that number is only growing. Mortgages are now costing Canadians 60% to 70% of their paycheque and, at the same time, banks continue to raise mortgage payments to respond to the eight consecutive rate hikes by the Bank of Canada. Over 80% of homeowners with a variable rate mortgage have hit the point where their mortgage payment is made entirely of just interest and none of that on the principal.

I hear from industry experts and people in the financial sector that they are already seeing a rise in the number of people turning in their keys and defaulting on their mortgages, a sign that we are dangerously close to repeating the Pierre Trudeau era. The ratio of household debt to disposable income is at an all-time high of 183%, proving that Canadians are over-leveraged amidst the Liberals' overspending. Bank of Canada governor Tiff Macklem is using this as a reason for pausing interest rates, despite him and the current finance minister telling Canadians it was okay to spend and borrow as much as they liked because interest rates were going to be so low for so long.

Now, when Canadians face this affordability crisis and high inflation and interest rates, Governor Macklem and the finance minister seem unconcerned with the potential for a debt default crisis. Instead, the Liberals are so ignorant that they keep spending on inflationary waste like their insider consultant contracts.

Random Liberals, like Bank of Canada governor Tiff Macklem, former governor of the Bank of Canada Mark Carney, former finance minister Bill Morneau, and former deputy prime minister and finance minister John Manley all warn that inflation is a domestic issue and the government is overspending. Debt is only going up, and nothing is being done to address it. Canadians are going hungry. Seniors are turning off the heat just so they can afford groceries, and young adults live in their parents' basements because home ownership is nothing but a dream. Household and national debt are at absolute highs.

Conservatives are ready to come in and clean up this mess. We are ready to rein in the wasteful spending and cut the rising taxes. Canadians need more of their money left in their pockets. We will unleash Canada's amazing private sector to create the technological advancements needed to address climate change. We will unleash the homebuilders, who will build more affordable housing supply, and the farmers, who will grow affordable food to stock our grocery stores and feed the world. We will get gatekeepers and red tape out of the way of our world-class energy sector, which can provide all Canadians with affordable, clean Canadian energy.

This is how to address this affordability crisis. This is how to grow an economy without increasing inflation. This is how to actually help Canadians. Enough with corporate handouts and insider contracts. Enough with government waste and out-of-control inflationary spending. Enough with the record deficits and doubling the debt. Conservatives will fire the gatekeepers and high-priced consultants, rein in the spending and axe the failed carbon tax. Let us get Canadians back on track and make Canada the freest country in the world.

[Rachel Bendayan, Liberal, Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister of Tourism and Associate Minister of Finance]

Madam Speaker, the hon. member spent some time discussing the importance of building homes and of the supply side of the housing crisis here in Canada. We, as a government, put forward a national housing strategy that would address that very issue, and the Conservatives voted against it. I would like to understand why it is that the member opposite talks about the importance of building new homes and yet votes against the very measure that would create more supply of housing here in Canada.

[Jasraj Singh Hallan, Conservative, Calgary Forest Lawn, AB]

Madam Speaker, we will always vote against inflationary measures that will only hurt Canadians further. None of those measures have been working. It is obvious to see when rents have doubled, mortgages have doubled and the house prices in this country have doubled all the way across. That does not make any sense at all.

The government is absolutely great at blaming everyone else for its own inflationary problems. It is kind of like me and the member for Kingston and the Islands blaming other people for being as big as we are. It is like saying the environment is the reason we are the way we are. No, it is because we did that to ourselves, much like the government is the one that spent so much money that it created this inflationary crisis, and random Liberals agree with us.

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

Madam Speaker, in The Art of Poetry, Horace said that things become pleasing through force of repetition. I think that may be why we keep hearing “triple, triple, triple” lately. Nevertheless, as it says in Ecclesiastes, “there is nothing new under the sun” in today's motion. It seems as though the Conservatives are just repeating things that they have already told us, and nobody knows why.

I would like to understand the rationale behind this hodgepodge of things that have already been said.

[Jasraj Singh Hallan, Conservative, Calgary Forest Lawn, AB]

Madam Speaker, obviously what we are repeating is working, since that member repeated what we are repeating. It is definitely working. It is too bad the Bloc party will not stand with Canadians, will not stand with Quebeckers, to help lower the cost of living today that the collective parties have caused on Canadians. There is more pain today than ever. It is too bad they are not standing with those 1.5 million Canadians who are visiting a food bank in a single month, the one in five Canadians who needs to skip meals or the seniors who need to turn down the heat and use blankets because they cannot afford to heat their homes and buy groceries at the same time. Conservatives will continue to fight this unjust tax and make sure Canadians can keep on living and have the best way of life.

[The Assistant Deputy Speaker, NDP, Carol Hughes]

The hon. member is rising on a point of order.

[Chris Warkentin, Conservative, Grande Prairie—Mackenzie, AB]

Madam Speaker, pursuant to Standing Order 43(2)(a), I would like to inform the House that the remaining Conservative caucus speaking slots are hereby divided in two.

[The Assistant Deputy Speaker, NDP, Carol Hughes]

I thank the deputy whip for the official opposition for that.

Questions and comments, the hon. member for Cowichan—Malahat—Langford.

[Alistair MacGregor, NDP, Cowichan—Malahat—Langford, BC]

Madam Speaker, I hear Conservatives talk a lot about inflation. When we look at the size of corporate profits, for example oil and gas, their profits since 2019 have gone up 1011%. All we hear from the Conservatives on that figure is crickets, so I would like to hear from my friend. When are Conservatives going to take a stand for Canadian families, when are they going to fight the real inflation, which is the absolute concentration of corporate power in Canada, and when are they going to take them on to make sure Canadians are not being raked through the mud by these overbearing corporate increases in prices on everyday items?

[Jasraj Singh Hallan, Conservative, Calgary Forest Lawn, AB]

Madam Speaker, it is too bad the NDP does not talk about government greed, the greed that actually is hurting Canadians. That is the tough part. New Democrats actually team up with the Liberal government to make sure home heating is more expensive, gas is more expensive and groceries are more expensive. Conservatives will make sure we axe the tax and make sure Canadians can keep the heat on.

[Adam Chambers, Conservative, Simcoe North, ON]

Madam Speaker, it is always a pleasure in this place. Today, I want to talk about inflation and spending. I have been here for just over a year. I have driven all over Ottawa, and I still cannot find the money tree that the government seems to have in its backyard, which it finds to spend on just about everything.

Let us find out why spending matters. It drives inflation. There are two kinds of inflation. There is demand-side inflation, where there is too much demand for too few goods or, as we often hear, too much money chasing too few goods. There is also supply-side inflation, which is not enough goods to meet the demand. We have both of those in Canada.

The problem is that the government would have us believe that the only issues causing inflation are supply-side issues that are outside of Canada's borders. However, many are now pointing out that inflation is being driven by too much demand in Canada, because we have too much money chasing too few goods. That is because we extended COVID supports longer than we needed to. We have prominent Liberal members, former members of Parliament, former finance ministers and former governors of the Bank of Canada suggesting that there is too much demand in Canada.

The Bank of Canada is trying to lower demand. That is why it keeps raising interest rates. However, when one raises interest rates, it really hurts people, including those vulnerable folks who are looking for shelter.

Inflation is even worse. Inflation hurts the lowest-income people, seniors and the most vulnerable Canadians the most. Every time they go to the grocery store, they feel like they are getting squeezed. They see it every day.

One of the main drivers of inflation is energy prices. It has been happening for the last number of years. Consistently, on this side of the House, we have put forward ideas to reduce the cost of energy. If one reduces the cost or the price of the thing causing inflation, one will reduce inflation.

I talked about spending and COVID supports. The government would have us believe that this is a binary discussion, and if one does not believe in government spending, then one did not support any of the COVID supports. That is not what we have been saying on this side of the House. In fact, this side of the House supported, in the very earliest days, the government putting forward programs to help people.

However, as COVID wore on and it became clear that there was abuse and that people were receiving COVID support payments that they should not have received, including prisoners, people who were lying, fraud artists and organized crime, people said, hang on a second, maybe we should consider making some changes. Even the Auditor General recommended that the government make some changes to the process they were using.

The government said not to worry. At the end it would go back, it would audit everybody and it would recover the money. However, the cheques were cashed and the money is gone. The CRA, which is supposed to be in charge of auditing the payments, said that it is not really worth the effort to go after everybody the Auditor General identified. That seems a little unnerving.

We are talking about $32 billion that the Auditor General said should be investigated. That is for payments that went to individuals who were ineligible but who got money anyway. There are also additional billions of dollars that went to people who were eligible, because of the government's poor design of a program, who should not have been eligible. That includes corporations that paid dividends to their shareholders, and they took the wage subsidy. They also had money to repurchase shares. That was about $7 billion or $8 billion. The Canadians for Tax Fairness put out a report yesterday showing how much abuse there was of the wage subsidy by very high-earning corporations.

In addition, we gave money to students, when the economy was open, to stay home and not work. That was another $8 billion or $9 billion. We are talking about almost $50 billion of COVID support payments out of a total $200 billion that might have gone to people who should not have had it. That is like 25% of the program.

That is why we are concerned. That is why we think that the Auditor General has given the government pretty good advice when she says that it should identify, go after and recover the payments.

It will increase Canadians' confidence in the integrity of the system. If the government just hopes that we all forget about it, Canadians are not going to believe that the government is working in their best interests. In fact, we need the government to take more seriously those who abuse the system so that it ensures the integrity of the system.

Canadians' support for institutions is falling, because the institutions are failing Canadians. We cannot simply say it is going to be too hard to look at these payments or to recover the money, so it is not really worth the effort. It should always be worth the effort to make sure that we recover payments that were improperly paid to Canadians.

We could have an honest discussion about those very low-income individuals who made an honest mistake when they applied. The amount is probably one or two billion dollars, and we could have a discussion about what kind of program, repayment or amnesty would make sense.

The Auditor General has called into question some of those payments. The Parliamentary Budget Officer also identified that over 40% of all spending that happened during COVID never actually went to helping Canadians through COVID. Those are two respected, independent officers of Parliament who have called into question the government's entire COVID support plan.

In times of inflation, we should always worry about top-line government spending, because when the government spends, it competes for goods. The government is spending 25% more per year, every year, than it did pre-COVID. The government calls that fiscal restraint. I have never met somebody who increases their spending by 25% and says they are spending a lot less money than we think they are.

We also have the tightest labour market ever seen. Unemployment is at an incredible low, yet the government continues to hire employees at a blistering pace. The private sector is trying to hire employees. They want to grow their businesses, to recover from COVID, to employ people who pay taxes and who pay corporate taxes. They cannot find anybody to work.

We have hotels with entire floors shut down, because they cannot find anybody to work there. It is not that they do not have the demand. They are turning people away. However, they do not have people to work, to open the rooms, to get the revenue, to pay the taxes, to pay the labour and to grow the GDP. Instead, the government wants to hire all those individuals and have them work for the government. That is not the way to grow ourselves out of this issue.

The government said, for almost five or six years, that we have to spend money because interest rates are so low. When the government was asked what happens if interest rates go up, it said not to worry because interest rates were going to remain low for the foreseeable future. When the government was asked what would happen to the cost of servicing the debt if interest rates went up, it said that was never going to happen.

Just this year, the government is going to spend $43 billion a year servicing and paying interest on the debt. Last year, it was $24 billion. Do members know how much we will spend on health care transfers to provinces next year? It will be $45 billion. We are going to spend almost as much money on servicing the debt as we will on transfers to the provinces for health care.

Everybody is wondering where we could find more money for health care. How about we spend less money on interest on the debt so that we would have more money for the things that Canadians rely on. However, that means we would have to spend less money on the things that are not important. The government has so many priorities that it has absolutely none at all.

The other issue is that the government does not need more revenue. The government has decided to continue to increasing taxes on things like the excise tax, which is a great example. The excise tax is going up on alcohol, beer, spirits and wine. It is going to cost industries tens of millions of dollars, which may even increase the price of those libations that members of Parliament and Canadians enjoy.

The government is increasing the excise tax because it linked it to inflation. However, when it decided to link that tax to inflation, no one believed that inflation was going to be 7%. All reasonable people are saying to take a pause on raising that tax. We do not need to continually hurt people as they try to purchase a six-pack of beer, a bottle of wine or a bottle of their favourite spirit.

The government does not need the revenue. It is making more money than it has ever made before. It is breaking records every day. The government needs to reduce its spending, to make sure that it is not taking on as much debt, to reduce the interest cost on the debt and to make sure that it does not compete with the private sector.

We need to make sure that we reduce inflation and to make sure Canadians can afford to live in this country.