Debates of Sept. 21st, 2023

Housing

[Sean Fraser, Liberal, Minister of Housing]

Mr. Speaker, if the hon. member is concerned about building affordable homes, he should talk to the people who advocate for the building of affordable homes. They are telling us to advance a full GST measure, not a half measure, because that is what is going to get homes built in this country.

The Leader of the Opposition plans to cut the housing accelerator fund, which is changing the way that cities build homes. He would literally cut money that would build homes and is planning to tax the people who build them. If he cannot see that this would not work, he should go back to his image consultant and tell them that he needs to start wearing glasses again.

[Some hon. members]

Oh, oh!

[The Speaker, Liberal, Anthony Rota]

Order. I want to remind both sides that pushing the envelope is one thing, but going over is another. I am hearing it from both sides. I want everybody to consider that when they are asking or answering the questions.

The hon. member for Beloeil—Chambly.

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

Mr. Speaker, yesterday, the minister responsible for housing admitted that there are strings attached to the $900 million Quebec is supposed to get to build social housing. The thing is, social housing is not his responsibility.

Is he telling people in distress, who may soon be unable to pay their rent or who are at risk of ending up homeless, that they are being held hostage by the Liberals' desire to centralize?

[Sean Fraser, Liberal, Minister of Housing]

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

Yesterday evening, I had a productive and positive conversation with my Quebec counterpart, Minister Duranceau. We are working in partnership with Quebec to establish programs to support people who need more affordable housing.

We are going to continue to work with provinces and our partners at different levels of government to establish programs that support vulnerable people, including in Quebec.

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

Mr. Speaker, we are wasting time while people are suffering. We know how to solve the problems of poverty, housing and homelessness. We are capable of funding social housing and we are capable of helping seniors who are struggling to make ends meet with the increased cost of living. Oil companies made $200 billion in profit last year, but the government does not have money for social housing or seniors.

Do the Liberals have the same level of compassion as the Conservatives?

[Jonathan Wilkinson, Liberal, Minister of Energy and Natural Resources]

Mr. Speaker, as I said yesterday, we have eliminated subsidies to the fossil fuel sector. We are working with all sectors of the economy, including the oil sector, to ensure that we create an economy that is clean, but also creates good jobs for Canadians.

[Alexandre Boulerice, NDP, Rosemont—La Petite-Patrie, QC]

Mr. Speaker, the housing crisis is the result of Liberal and Conservative budget cuts to social housing and co-operative housing programs. Now we are learning that the elimination of the GST on housing construction does not include a definition of affordable housing. It is absolutely ridiculous, insulting even. What planet do the Liberals live on? Housing is a fundamental right. People's lives are at stake.

Will the Liberals put people before profits and build two million social and co-operative housing units?

[Soraya Martinez Ferrada, Liberal, Minister of Tourism and Minister responsible for the Economic Development Agency of Canada for the Regions of Quebec]

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

I would like to remind him that, for the first time, the federal government has not only adopted a national housing strategy but has also appointed a federal housing advocate.

On this side of the House, we believe that all Quebeckers have the right to housing. That is why we have made historic investments with Quebec, to ensure that all Quebeckers have a roof over their heads.

[Lindsay Mathyssen, NDP, London—Fanshawe, ON]

Mr. Speaker, the Liberals finally listened to the NDP and tabled their housing plan to remove the GST from building new homes, but people in London are getting evicted by rich developers. Liberals and Conservatives have spent the last 30 years creating this housing crisis and have caused people in my riding, like the tenants of Webster Street, to be pushed out of their buildings so a corporate landlord can be even greedier.

The Liberal plan does nothing to stop profiteering landlords from throwing people onto the streets, so please, will the government steal another idea from the NDP and announce a housing acquisition fund so co-ops and non-profits can keep people in their homes?

[Sean Fraser, Liberal, Minister of Housing]

Mr. Speaker, as I am sure the hon. member knows by now, we had the opportunity to visit her community in the city of London, where I met with non-profit housing providers who are doing extraordinary work on the ground to support people and prevent them from falling into homelessness. She may have also seen that we worked closely with the city and council under Mayor Josh Morgan's leadership to invest $74 million, which is going to change the way the City of London builds homes going forward. In the next few years, it will add thousands of homes to the supply in that city, which will drive down costs, make housing more affordable and allow people to enjoy life in a complete community in the city of London. We are proud of that work.

Immigration, Refugees and Citizenship

[Pierre Poilievre, Conservative, Leader of the Opposition]

Mr. Speaker, after doubling the cost of housing in this country, the Prime Minister thought he would appoint someone to fix the mess he made who was in charge of immigration when they put refugees on the streets and under bridges and when they had international students sold into prostitution and human trafficking. He says that I need glasses. This is the same minister who lost a million people. He literally lost track of a million people who came into the country.

Can the minister please tell us, glasses, binoculars or otherwise, how one loses a million people?

[Marc Miller, Liberal, Minister of Immigration]

Mr. Speaker, I think members can see how thin-skinned the Leader of the Opposition can get when he gets a piece of his own medicine.

International students are a credit to this country. They are the future of this country and are an asset that is very lucrative, and we cannot let them down. Clearly we need to work with the provinces to make sure they have proper housing, and we have to crack down on agents who are giving them false hope across the country, but let us not make this a partisan issue.

[Pierre Poilievre, Conservative, Leader of the Opposition]

Mr. Speaker, the question was how one loses a million people. How is it that the Prime Minister scoured his entire front bench, and hopefully he even gave a little attention to his beleaguered back bench when he was shuffling the cabinet, and the one guy he could find to fix the doubling of housing costs that he incurred as Prime Minister was the guy who lost a million people, the guy who who will go down in history in the Guinness Book of World Records as having lost more people than have ever been lost in the history of the world? How is it possible they could not find anyone better than that to put in charge of housing?

[Karina Gould, Liberal, Leader of the Government in the House of Commons]

Mr. Speaker, while the Conservatives stay focused on us, we are going to stay focused on Canadians. While the Leader of the Opposition is making personal attacks, we are going to continue to support the personal lives of Canadians. Whether that is by helping them through tough times like COVID or helping them through difficult times right now with inflation, we are going to continue to be there for Canadians, and that will remain—

[Some hon. members]

Oh, oh!

[The Speaker, Liberal, Anthony Rota]

I am having a hard time hearing the hon. minister. Let us try the other end of the list here. The hon. member for Spadina—Fort York, if he does not mind, can give me his question, and then we will come back to the list and see if everything calms down a bit.

The hon. member for Spadina—Fort York.

[Kevin Vuong, Independent, Spadina—Fort York, ON]

Mr. Speaker, on June 9, I asked the government if it was aware of an apartheid era visa process at our high commission in South Africa. The government said it takes racism seriously and has rolled out anti-racism training in visa offices, including in South Africa. However, I recently met with Canadian High Commissioner Chris Cooter in Pretoria and, astoundingly, he said he was not aware of any racism issues.

Who am I to believe, the government, an IRCC committee report that specifically identified mission racism in Africa or an out-of-touch high commissioner?

[Marc Miller, Liberal, Minister of Immigration]

Mr. Speaker, clearly our government institutions are subject to systemic racism. We should not deny that. Better than that, we need to act on it. It is why I have instructed my deputy minister to work with her team to make sure that we are addressing racism and systemic racism across the government but particularly in Immigration, Refugees and Citizenship Canada.

If we look at the statistics online with respect to African migration, the statistics have gone up. We need to do better and we need to look at the way we process those things because we need to have a discussion about race in this country.

Finance

[Andrew Scheer, Conservative, Regina—Qu'Appelle, SK]

Mr. Speaker, after eight years of the Prime Minister, it is crystal clear that he is not worth the cost. His deficits are driving up inflation. Even his finance minister knows this. Just one year ago, she said that her goal was to “not pour fuel on the fire of inflation”.

Then what did she do? She grabbed the jerry can and poured $60 billion of new spending on that dumpster fire. The result was higher inflation, which means higher interest rates, which means Canadians will have bigger mortgage payments and may not be able to stay in their homes.

Time is running out. When will the government stop its inflationary deficits so that Canadians can keep a roof over their heads?

[Rachel Bendayan, Liberal, Parliamentary Secretary to the Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of Finance]

Mr. Speaker, what I heard from Canadians, what every member of our government heard from Canadians, is that they want lower rent and lower grocery and food prices.

Today we introduced legislation that will help do just that. The affordable housing and groceries act will remove the GST from the construction of rental housing in order to build more homes in this country faster. It also strengthens Canada's competition laws in order to help stabilize prices for all Canadians.

We are laser-focused on the needs of Canadians and we are responding substantively. What are the Conservatives doing?

[Andrew Scheer, Conservative, Regina—Qu'Appelle, SK]

Mr. Speaker, the problem is that their inflationary spending is evaporating any benefit that Canadians might hope for. The Prime Minister admitted in this House that any benefit their programs might have provided Canadians was completely wiped out by higher inflation and higher interest rates.

The former Liberal finance minister knows this. John Manley said, “This is a bit like driving your car with one foot on the gas and the other on the brake generally.... That’s not a good plan for controlling the direction of your vehicle, not a good plan for controlling the direction of the economy either.”

This reckless driving is forcing Canadians out of their homes and pushing food off their table. When will they stop the inflationary deficits so that Canadians can stay in their homes?

[Jenna Sudds, Liberal, Minister of Families]

Mr. Speaker, if we want to talk about affordability, just this week, up to $619 has arrived in Canadian families' bank accounts. That is $619 to help with groceries, school supplies and new sneakers. The Canada child benefit has helped lift literally hundreds of thousands of children out of poverty. We will continue to do all we can to support Canadian families.

[Pierre Paul-Hus, Conservative, Charlesbourg—Haute-Saint-Charles, QC]

Mr. Speaker, news reports this morning show that in all of Canada, Quebeckers are struggling with inflation the most. Housing costs have climbed by 16.7%, while mortgage interest costs have jumped by 37% and gasoline by 51.5%.

The Prime Minister seems intent on making things worse with his ongoing inflationary spending and gas tax hikes.

Will the Prime Minister put an end to his inflationary policies to give Quebeckers a break and keep mortgage payments from going up again?

[Rachel Bendayan, Liberal, Parliamentary Secretary to the Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of Finance]

Mr. Speaker, I know why the Conservatives are having a hard time connecting with Quebeckers. Quebeckers simply do not buy their policy of fiscal restraint. The Conservatives want to cut employment insurance, cut seniors' pensions and cut child care subsidies.

We sent $6 billion to the Quebec government for child care, and the Conservatives want to cut that too.