Debates of March 22nd, 2023

Grocery Industry

[Jagmeet Singh, NDP, Burnaby South, BC]

Mr. Speaker, we are seeing the cost of living continue to hit hard across the country. People are struggling with the cost of everything.

We know that some numbers have come down with inflation, but, really, where it counts, like groceries, inflation is still over 10%. That means people go into a grocery store, pick up items, realize they cannot afford them and put them back. At the same time, corporate CEOs for these grocery stores are making record profits.

When will the Prime Minister stop the excess profit being made by his CEO friends and stand up for Canadians so they can afford their groceries?

[Justin Trudeau, Liberal, Prime Minister]

Mr. Speaker, as inflation was hitting in the fall, we stepped up with support for 11 million Canadians through a GST rebate over six months. We moved forward on dental care supports so that over 200,000 kids could afford to go to the dentist. We moved forward with extra help for families that need help paying their rent.

These are the kinds of things we will continue to do to help Canadians. Child care costs are down, cut in half to $10 a day for millions of families across this country. These are the kinds of things that have made a difference. We will continue to be there for Canadians, including with the budget coming out next week.

Housing

[Jagmeet Singh, NDP, Burnaby South, BC]

Mr. Speaker, the cost of living is on the rise. It is getting harder and harder to make ends meet. Affordable housing is especially hard to come by. Since this Prime Minister was elected, rents have doubled because the rules established by the Conservatives and the Liberals favour the ultrarich.

When is this Prime Minister going to stop favouring his rich friends and build more affordable housing for the average person?

[Justin Trudeau, Liberal, Prime Minister]

Mr. Speaker, over the past eight years, we have made historic investments in housing to give Canadians access to more affordable housing.

In fact, that is why I was so pleased to be in Guelph, Ontario, last week to announce $4 billion in investments for municipalities across the country to build housing faster, particularly affordable housing.

We know there is still a lot of work to do, but with our housing accelerator fund, our rapid housing initiative, our homelessness strategy and our affordability plan, we will continue to be there for Canadians.

[Pierre Poilievre, Conservative, Leader of the Opposition]

Mr. Speaker, I asked the Prime Minister why mortgage payments have doubled under his eight years, why rent payments have doubled under his eight years and why Canadian house prices are about 72% more expensive than their American counterparts, even though it has 10 times the population on even less land. He could not answer any of these question.

The answer, according to Scotiabank, is that “Canada has the lowest number of housing units per 1,000 residents of any G7 country. The number of housing units per 1,000 Canadians has been falling since 2016”, right when the Prime Minister took office.

Why has the Prime Minister continually given billions of dollars to municipal government gatekeepers but blocked the construction of Canadian homes?

[Justin Trudeau, Liberal, Prime Minister]

Mr. Speaker, this goes to the heart of the disagreement on housing between the Leader of the Opposition and I. I recognize, as this government recognizes, that we need to work with municipalities to help them change zoning laws, to help them accelerate their permitting processes and to create more opportunities to build affordable homes for Canadians across the country, whereas he sits back and attacks them and proposes absolutely nothing.

We are stepping up with $4 billion to accelerate the supply of homes across this country. We will continue to invest and work with partners instead of picking fights with everyone and hoping that it all settles itself.

[Pierre Poilievre, Conservative, Leader of the Opposition]

Mr. Speaker, no, actually the disagreement is that under our government housing was affordable, but under this government it is eye-poppingly expensive. That is the disagreement.

Let us just look at the facts. Canada has the fewest houses per capita of any country in the G7, even though we have the most land to build on. Why? We rank 64th in the OECD in the time it takes to get a building permit. Government red tape adds as much as $650,000 to each house in some cities, and the Prime Minister has made it worse by giving gatekeepers that block building more money. Why?

[Justin Trudeau, Liberal, Prime Minister]

Mr. Speaker, this goes to the heart of the announcement we made last week on the housing accelerator fund, which works directly with municipalities to accelerate the delivery and construction of affordable housing.

What the member opposite would have us believe is that doing nothing to address the housing crisis would have somehow made it better. He criticizes us for the investment of billions of dollars in housing over the past years. Just think, if things are expensive now, how much worse it would have been had we had a Conservative government that continued to cross its arms and cut services to Canadians for the past eight years.

[Pierre Poilievre, Conservative, Leader of the Opposition]

Mr. Speaker, we do not have to imagine what prices would have been were I making the decisions, because when I was the housing minister, the average mortgage payment and the average rent payment were half of what they are now. We do not have to imagine that; it is called history.

The Prime Minister's solution is to continue to spend billions of dollars. He spent $89 billion on housing affordability to double mortgage payments, double rental costs and double the needed down payment. How did he spend so much to achieve so little?

[Justin Trudeau, Liberal, Prime Minister]

Mr. Speaker, the next thing the member opposite is going to complain about is that housing prices are higher today than they were in my father's time as prime minister.

We are going to continue to invest in Canadians and recognize that while we grow the economy, while we—

[Some hon. members]

Oh, oh!

[The Speaker, Liberal, Anthony Rota]

I am going to have to interrupt the right hon. Prime Minister. I am having a hard time hearing the answer and I am sure other people are too.

The right hon. Prime Minister, please continue.

[Justin Trudeau, Liberal, Papineau, QC]

Mr. Speaker, every step of the way, we have contributed to a growing economy, to lifting Canadians out of poverty and to putting more money in the pockets of the middle class and people working hard to join it. That is why we are continuing to invest in building houses and in working with municipalities and the provinces on fighting homelessness, creating affordable homes and creating more opportunities for all Canadians.

[Pierre Poilievre, Conservative, Leader of the Opposition]

Mr. Speaker, when we look at his promise to make it easier for Canadians to get homes, since that time, the payments have actually doubled. We listen to him rattle off the billions he has spent to achieve that failure, and he kind of reminds me of that shady contractor who promises he will build a brand new home, but the cost just keeps going up and up, and the house never actually gets built. That is exactly where young people are today, stuck in their parents' basements, their dreams crushed because they cannot get themselves homes and start families.

Instead of siding with the gatekeepers and sending billions of dollars more to those bureaucracies, why will he not get them out of the way to bring the homes Canadians can afford?

[Justin Trudeau, Liberal, Prime Minister]

Mr. Speaker, the Conservative leader is actually arguing that fewer investments in Canadians, fewer investments alongside municipalities and provinces, and fewer programs to support Canadians would somehow have solved this problem. That is the problem with Conservatives. They think cuts can create growth. They think fewer investments in Canadians will get people to pull themselves up by their bootstraps and succeed.

We believe in investing in the middle class and people working hard to join it, and that is why Canadians are doing better than they were before.

[Pierre Poilievre, Conservative, Leader of the Opposition]

In other words, Mr. Speaker, we should forgive him for failing because he fails expensively.

What we propose is actually to incentivize home building. Why does the government not link the number of federal infrastructure dollars a big city gets to the number of houses that actually get completed? That would incentivize them to get the gatekeepers out of the way. We could bring in penalties for big-city bureaucrats who block construction and boost infrastructure dollars for those who get out of the way.

Why will he not pay for results instead of paying for failure?

[Justin Trudeau, Liberal, Prime Minister]

Mr. Speaker, Canadians well remember that when the hon. member was in government, the character of the relationships between provinces, municipalities and the federal government was fights all the time. There were conflicts and fights with cities, conflicts and fights with rural mayors, conflicts and fights with provinces, and cuts to services that Canadians relied on. The member is demonstrating that eight years of investments in Canadians in growth, in lifting Canadians out of poverty, in creating jobs and in fighting climate change just makes him want to go back to the good old days of Stephen Harper, with cuts and fights with everyone.

[Pierre Poilievre, Conservative, Leader of the Opposition]

Mr. Speaker, the Prime Minister says that Canadians should not worry about the fact that our young people are living in homeless shelters while they go to school or that they are condemned to tent cities or their parents' basements, because all the politicians are getting along and that is what is important. As long as we go along, get along and have wonderful meetings and conversations, he believes we should not worry about the poverty the gatekeeping policies are causing.

Why will the Prime Minister not link federal infrastructure dollars for cities to the number of houses they allow to be built, fine those gatekeepers who block and give bonuses to those who build, so that we can have more affordable homes for our young people?

[Justin Trudeau, Liberal, Prime Minister]

Mr. Speaker, the member opposite wants to talk about poverty, so let us talk about poverty. The very first thing he did after we formed the government was to vote against a tax hike on the wealthiest so we could lower taxes for the middle class. He then voted against a Canada child benefit that has lifted hundreds of thousands of kids out of poverty. We created millions of jobs while lifting millions of Canadians out of poverty. Our focus on growing the middle class and supporting people working hard to join it has delivered, and is continuing to deliver, even as we stand with people going through difficult times right now. We cannot grow this economy through cuts, no matter how much he shouts that he—

[The Speaker, Liberal, Anthony Rota]

The hon. member for Beloeil—Chambly.

Democratic Institutions

[Yves-François Blanchet, Bloc, Beloeil—Chambly, QC]

Mr. Speaker, the Prime Minister says we should not be partisan. That is rich, coming from him.

If that is how he feels, why do so many members in the House get the feeling that he is willing to do anything and everything to avoid an independent public inquiry? A public inquiry is urgently needed, and it should not be conducted by a family friend.

[Justin Trudeau, Liberal, Prime Minister]

Mr. Speaker, what Canadians expect is that issues as serious as foreign interference, particularly Chinese interference, will be dealt with in a serious and responsible manner. We know that is exactly what the former governor general is going to do. To question his commitment to Canadians and to Canada is unbecoming of the House.

We know that he is a man who will deliver for Canadians and restore public trust, in spite of all the partisan attacks being levelled at him.

[Yves-François Blanchet, Bloc, Beloeil—Chambly, QC]

Mr. Speaker, my point is that the work must be done for everyone in the House and for all of our constituents. I am not convinced that that is going to happen. All opposition parties in the House want an independent public inquiry.

At a time when all eyes in the U.S. are about to be on Ottawa, which tolerates interference and looks like it has something to hide, who is being partisan here?

[Justin Trudeau, Liberal, Prime Minister]

Mr. Speaker, we established an independent process to address the real problem of Chinese interference.

We did more than just appoint the special rapporteur. We also created a committee of parliamentarians that includes a Bloc Québécois member. These parliamentarians have the right security clearance to be able to delve into everything we are hearing, into all the work that our security agencies do. As they have always done, they will publish reports that all parliamentarians can access and read.

The work is being done in an independent, non-partisan manner. The opposition parties are the only ones still trying to politicize this situation.

Housing

[Pierre Poilievre, Conservative, Leader of the Opposition]

Mr. Speaker, the Prime Minister has failed to make housing affordable, even after $89 billion, precious tax dollars, have been spent on that failure. I have suggested to him that we should link the number of dollars a big city gets to the number of houses it allows to be built, in order to incentivize more building. He does not like that idea. He does not like results.

Here is another idea: We build transit stations with federal money. In the most successful transit and housing jurisdictions on earth, there are apartments next to those stations.

Will the Prime Minister require that every federally funded transit station have high-density apartments so that our seniors and young people can live right next to the bus or train?