Debates of April 30th, 2024

Financial Statement of Minister of Finance

[Adam van Koeverden, Liberal, Milton, ON]

Mr. Speaker, my point is that an average fifth grader knows that it is unproductive to heckle, name call and denigrate people on the basis of how much one person knows or another person knows.

Does the member not know that it is the job of the Bank of Canada and the Governor of the Bank of Canada to think about and consider monetary policy? It is not so much the role of government to talk about and think about monetary policy. I know the Conservatives have made much hay out of the Prime Minister's statement that it is actually the job of the Bank of Canada to talk about and think about monetary policy and that it is the federal government's job to make economic policy, fiscal policy and decisions on spending.

The fifth graders of Martin Street Public School know the difference and perhaps the Conservatives could learn fifth grade civics, because that is where we learn about the jurisdictions of the various institutions in our government and country.

[Ziad Aboultaif, Conservative, Edmonton Manning, AB]

Mr. Speaker, I would excuse the hon. member opposite. It is like the Prime Minister asking him to sell a radish as a strawberry. They are trying to convince Canadians of their mismanagement and inability to balance the budget whatsoever. This is the situation. Philosophically, if the Prime Minister does not think about fiscal responsibility and fiscal or monetary policy, what does he think about? This—

[Some hon. members]

Oh, oh!

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

The problem is that members are still heckling everybody all the time.

The hon. member for Edmonton Manning.

[Ziad Aboultaif, Conservative, Edmonton Manning, AB]

Mr. Speaker, the Liberals are complaining about the Conservatives heckling. They are heckling because they do not accept any logic, reality or truth. This is the shape of a government with which we are dealing. If their Prime Minister does not think about monetary policy, that means we are in trouble and we are, indeed, in trouble because of that type of thinking.

[Blake Desjarlais, NDP, Edmonton Griesbach, AB]

Mr. Speaker, grade 5 students certainly know a lot. The students in the member's riding of Edmonton Manning asked me a simple math question, which I will ask the member.

The member said that the Conservatives were going to axe the carbon tax. Let us do the math on some of this tax in Alberta when it comes to fuel. Three cents is the Government of Canada's carbon tax. Four cents is the United Conservative Party of Alberta's fuel tax, but gas went up 20¢. Therefore, who gets rich from the 13¢ that the member never talks about? Who is getting the 13¢? Could the member do the math on that?

[Ziad Aboultaif, Conservative, Edmonton Manning, AB]

Mr. Speaker, I do not think we are speaking of two types of residents. I receive so many complaints from Canadians, from Albertans, from my riding and from his riding, my neighbour riding, about the carbon tax.

The hon. member needs to convince his own constituents about the carbon tax and explain how crazy life has become since it was increased. He and his party have supported the government in increasing the cost of living for Canadians, as well as the cost of groceries. If the member can convince his own people in Alberta, then I will be satisfied.

[Robert Gordon Kitchen, Conservative, Souris—Moose Mountain, SK]

Mr. Speaker, I have also received many letters from my constituents about the same issues. They talk about how disgusted they are with this budget. The reality is that they see it as unfair. Part of what they talk about is how the government is promoting fairness, yet the Liberals have failed to mention that when they came into power, the national debt was $600 billion. Now, it is $1.2 trillion, and when looking at the budget, it says that in five years the national debt will be up another $280 billion. That does not seem fair to the gen Z and the millennial Canadians as they progress five years down the road because they are going to have to pay for it.

Could my colleague comment on that?

[Ziad Aboultaif, Conservative, Edmonton Manning, AB]

Mr. Speaker, there is no fairness in making people's lives miserable. There is no fairness in making people's lives unaffordable. There is no fairness when people cannot buy food to feed their kids. There is no fairness in what the government is doing, and they must stop. This is what Canadians are asking us for. This is what my constituents are asking me for.

[Judy Sgro, Liberal, Humber River—Black Creek, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I am very glad to stand today to give some comments on this very important budget, which really is a framework as we are moving forward.

I am very pleased to share my time with the member for Dorval—Lachine—LaSalle, a former member of our international trade committee, who we miss at the committee now, but she has moved on to other things.

I have been speaking over this past weekend, especially with my constituents, with other community leaders and with family and friends, about the budget because—

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

I know there is some debate going on in the chamber. I would ask those individuals who are having an extra debate or a continued debate to take it outside into the lobbies. Of course, they are not listening to me because they are into that debate.

Maybe the hon. member for Edmonton Griesbach and the hon. member for Edmonton Manning would take their conversation outside. That would be great because we do have somebody chatting.

The hon. member for Humber River—Black Creek.

[Judy Sgro, Liberal, Humber River—Black Creek, ON]

Mr. Speaker, in these discussions, very often we all feel very strongly about different positions we take on something as important as this budget. This budget would be the playbook for the next several years in our country and would make significant headway in trying to improve the lives of all Canadians.

As I indicated earlier, I have been speaking with my constituents and my community leaders. Many of them feel that the budget is going in the right direction and that it would make a difference in the lives of Canadians. At the end of the day, we have to think about why we are here and what this is all about.

Budgets are laying out the future, and the future reflects the needs of Canadians. That not only means investing in social programs, but also means investing in entrepreneurs and in small and medium-sized businesses, giving them the tools they need to grow their businesses and to do everything possible to grow our country.

There were announcements last week about Honda, and those kinds of investments are going to create thousands of jobs. We could reflect back on years when things were very tough. People were out of work and were just begging to find jobs so that they would be able to contribute to their families and would not have to use unemployment insurance. Now, we talk about such an abundance of jobs that we are going to have, not only today, as our economy is doing very well, but also in the future, with the investment in Alliston for the Honda EV plant. It is really the future for Canadians.

This will create jobs for so many Canadians so that they can buy houses and grow their families. It means a successful Canada, so Canada is in a very good position. In spite of what we hear from the official opposition about Canada being in a terrible place, Canada is in a very good spot. We are still in the top in the G7, and we are still doing very well, but there is much more to do. I think this budget is laying out that platform for exactly what we need to do to move it forward.

I am glad to see all the initiatives in this year's budget that directly address concerns Canadians throughout Canada have, but especially the residents in my riding of Humber River—Black Creek. I have often spoken about my constituents and the messages they want me to pass on here in the House of Commons, whether they are the need for social programs or for increases in Canada child benefit.

I hear a lot from seniors about how difficult it is. Even with the increases, which have been significant, that we have contributed to since 2015, seniors are still struggling, and as the cost of living goes up, through our various programs, we have been able to make the kinds of changes that assist and help them, like the carbon tax rebates that all the seniors are receiving.

The Conservatives continue to say that it is not acceptable, that it should not be there and that we should scrap the carbon tax. However, we cannot stop the wildfires that are happening, and we need to make sure that people are taking whatever steps are necessary to make our country safer and to make the effective changes we need to protect our systems.

Budget 2024 would help make life more affordable for every generation of Canadians by creating access to more affordable housing, lowering everyday costs and growing our economy. I am sure anyone who watches question period or watches what is going on in the House knows that we have talked about investing millions and millions of dollars in housing, and it is long overdue. This should have been done a long time ago.

I recall, back in Paul Martin's days, when we were going to have a national minister for housing, and that was one thing that was greatly debated. It was announced that we were going to establish a minister of housing to get back into the housing business. Unfortunately, our government at that time was defeated on a budgetary motion vote of confidence, and we did not resume the opportunity to introduce that until we started to get back into power in 2015.

I would have liked to see, as the very first thing we did, the establishment of a minister of housing to get right into the housing file. However, everything takes time, as all of us in government know, and it took quite a while until we finally got a minister of housing and got the focus put some of the things we needed to do, which was to make sure that there was more affordable housing being built, that it was housing everybody could afford and that it would increase the availability in the housing stock.

One thing we would do in this budget to help with that housing need would be to introduce a 30-year amortization for first-time buyers. Yes, we have thousands of buyers. I have several grandkids who are looking to buy homes, and they are looking at an interest rate that we do not control. I had a 25-year amortization, as some people in the House currently have. This is a 30-year period, which would significantly lower it, and the interest rates will help my grandkids, as well as many others, buy homes. Making it easier for Canadians to buy their first homes is really important.

We are also launching a $1.5-billion Canada rental protection fund to protect affordable housing and apartments. We all hear about it when we go back to our ridings, and we hear stories about apartment buildings being converted into expensive condos. It is a real loss of what we call affordable housing and affordable rental housing. Not everybody wants to purchase housing. Some people want good, affordable rental housing.

Many properties, especially the older stock in ridings like Humber River—Black Creek, are often redeveloped, and they come on the market at a very high price. That is a loss of affordable rental housing. The $1.5-billion Canada rental protection fund is meant to prevent that from happening. It would protect that level of affordable housing so that we would have more apartments for seniors, for families and for students.

We have also introduced flexibilities for the federal community housing initiative. It would ensure access to funding to maintain affordability for low-income tenants and for co-op members. I have, I believe, four co-ops in my riding. They are extremely successful. I often talk to the people there. There is a long wait-list to get into those co-ops. Once people are there, frankly, they are very comfortable. They like their neighbours, and they do not want to move. The answer is not that they have to move; the answer is to have more co-op housing on the market.

When there is a range of different incomes sharing housing, it builds better and stronger communities. It also provides a housing level that is affordable for a lot of people. There are some who would never be able to afford the kind of housing market that exists now. If somebody is paying millions of dollars, it must mean that they are doing extremely well, and we would hope that they have the opportunity to do that. The federal community housing initiative would provide $150 million for 47,000 homes and would make sure they will be there as we move into the future.

As members can tell, I am focusing on housing, and these investments are extremely important for Humber River—Black Creek. People do not have anywhere to move. Seniors want to sell their homes, which would provide nice, affordable housing for first-time homebuyers, but they have no where to go. They do not want to go to a retirement home. They just want to go into safe rental housing that would give them a chance to continue to enjoy their remaining years.

I am very proud to have York University in my riding, where many students call Humber River—Black Creek home. Over 3,000 students actually live on campus at York University. There has been a huge amount of housing built there. It is all meant to house students, but as the university grows and expands, there needs to be more opportunity.

I have covered a few issues, mostly on housing, but I would like to talk about this further. I will be glad to respond to questions about pharmacare and about the new dental program, which is being received so well in Humber River—Black Creek. These are exciting times. It is a challenging time for the government to manoeuver the proper way, but I believe this budget is a good step forward, and I am looking forward to answering questions.

[Stephen Ellis, Conservative, Cumberland—Colchester, NS]

Madam Speaker, the member talked a lot about housing and the incredible number of photo ops, billions of dollars of photo ops, which the NDP-Liberal government has had with respect to housing. I have a really simple question for the member, and I am sure she can provide an answer to the House and to all Canadians.

As of today, how many houses has the NDP-Liberal government actually built for the billions of dollars of photo ops?

[Judy Sgro, Liberal, Humber River—Black Creek, ON]

Madam Speaker, I want to thank my hon. colleague for his support for the national eye strategy, which is now in the Senate. I would urge him to talk to the Conservative members in the Senate and ask them to please pass Bill C-284 for the national eye strategy.

I will move on to the question he asked me about housing. It is no secret that housing takes years to build, but we have been building housing for several years. About a thousand units have gone up in the west end of Toronto in the last two years. This housing is up now and available. There will be much more, but we all know it takes time to build housing.

[Louise Chabot, Bloc, Thérèse-De Blainville, QC]

Madam Speaker, I listened with interest to the member’s presentation.

No one here will deny that there is a housing crisis, to be sure. We have been talking about it for a long time, and we have been providing examples to highlight the issues for a long time. The government had a national housing strategy. Is the fact that we are talking about it now an admission of failure about its own strategy? In fact, it is the provinces, cities and municipalities that are in charge of housing.

The main thing I want to say about the budget is that you can list all the measures you want, but it will not do well in the polls. You did not wow anyone. There is no wow factor.

There is a lot of interference in provincial and Quebec jurisdictions. However, when it comes to your own areas of jurisdiction, such as pensions, old age security and employment insurance, there is nothing. There is no commitment from the government to finally eliminate discrimination against seniors aged 65 to 74. There is no commitment from the government to reform the EI system, which leaves behind thousands of unemployed people.

What does the government have to say about not investing in its own programs?

[The Assistant Deputy Speaker, NDP, Carol Hughes]

The hon. member has just begun to speak directly to the government, and I would like to remind her that she should direct all comments and remarks to the Chair.

The hon. member for Humber River—Black Creek.

[Judy Sgro, Liberal, Humber River—Black Creek, ON]

Madam Speaker, when we talk about housing and why the housing file is so complex, it is the responsibility of municipalities. It is their job to work with developers to see that housing gets built. For far too long, too many municipalities have put up as many roadblocks as possible against much of this housing. People say that they do not want it in their backyard or that they do not want apartment buildings or condos in their backyard. They want to keep the same kind of community they have always had. It is admirable to want that, but the world is expanding. Immigration is a huge tool for Canada, and we need it to happen, but we need to have housing built. It takes the municipalities to do that.

[Peter Julian, NDP, New Westminster—Burnaby, BC]

Madam Speaker, the Harper Conservative government members were terrible fiscal managers. They gave away $30 billion a year to overseas tax havens, massive subsidies to oil and gas CEOs and bank bailouts. Unfortunately, the Liberal government has continued many of the bad financial management practices we saw under the Harper government.

The massive corporate subsidies that are going out started under the Conservatives and seem to be continuing under the Liberals. Why will the Liberals not rein them in?

[Judy Sgro, Liberal, Humber River—Black Creek, ON]

Madam Speaker, I thank my hon. colleague for supporting the national eye strategy bill.

We all know that corporations need to do well in this country. They employ thousands and thousands of people. They need to make money. I am glad they make money, because we use that for all the programs we talk about and all the investments that go into Canada. It comes from corporations. It is not coming from the government.

[Anju Dhillon, Liberal, Dorval—Lachine—LaSalle, QC]

Madam Speaker, I am honoured to speak today about the 2024 budget, our plan to ensure fairness for every generation.

Our government firmly believes that everyone deserves to get ahead, including our young people. Unfortunately, we find that too many young Canadians are struggling to be as successful as their parents. It is clear that young people are not being rewarded for their hard work the way previous generations were and that their paycheque is simply not enough to keep up with the current increase in the cost of living.

Obviously, this means that our young people are finding it increasingly difficult to save enough to make their dreams a reality. Needless to say, this is very concerning to our government. That is why we are moving forward in budget 2024 with numerous measures to ensure that our young people have a fair chance at success and to give them the means to make their dreams come true. To ensure fairness, we must support one another at every stage in life and invest in one another. We feel that children deserve to get off to the best possible start in life.

However, today, nearly one in four children in Canada do not have enough to eat, which harms their health, their learning and their development. That is obviously a serious problem. That is why, in budget 2024, we are proposing a new national school food program. With an investment of $1 billion over five years, we aim to provide meals to 400,000 children every year, in addition to those served by existing school food programs. I am very happy that we are able to give our children a helping hand as they make their start in life.

It is precisely because we wish to offer children the best possible start in life that we have also created a Canada-wide early learning and child care system. Right now, all of Canada’s provinces and territories are already offering or on the verge of offering $10-a-day child care. Before the Canada-wide system was implemented, child care costs were on par with monthly rent or even mortgage payments, making it difficult to start and support a family. It forced many parents, mothers in particular, to make the impossible choice between pursuing a career and staying at home with the children. It was heartbreaking.

It is interesting to note that women’s participation in the workforce reached record levels after the system was implemented. However, even today, too few families have access to affordable child care. That is why we are building more spaces, as well as taking measures to ensure that even more will be built.

In the budget, our government proposes launching a new child care expansion loan program, which will provide $1 billion in low-cost loans and $60 million in non-repayable contributions. This program will allow public and not-for-profit child care providers to build new child care spaces and renovate their existing child care centres. We propose offering student loan forgiveness for rural and remote early childhood educators. This represents a $48-million investment over four years.

Again with the aim of making sure that our young people have a fair chance of succeeding, we also propose measures to train young Canadians and enable them to acquire a rewarding work experience. For example, we propose increasing, for another year, the Canada student grant for full-time students, raising it from $3,000 to $4,200 annually, as well as interest-free Canada student loans, which will increase from $210 to $300 per week.

Also, we propose to invest over $207.6 million in 2025-26 in the student work placement program to help create more work placement opportunities for students. This is an excellent way for post-secondary students to launch their career and get their first professional experience.

When we talk about rewarding hard work, we are also talking about housing, of course. We fully understand that housing is one of the key concerns facing young people today. This is particularly true for renters, who feel that the deck is stacked against them. That is why budget 2024 proposes measures to support and protect tenants. For example, we want to launch a new tenant protection fund worth $15 million to fund legal aid and tenants’ rights advocacy organizations.

We want tenants’ credit ratings to reflect on-time rent payments. Renters deserve to have their credit rating take into account the money they have spent on rent over the years, particularly when they submit a mortgage application to buy their first home.

This brings me to the dream of many young Canadians to purchase their first home. While this dream may seem out of reach today for too many young Canadians, we fully understand that the difficult struggle to pay for a down payment and obtaining an affordable mortgage is among the greatest pressures weighing on young Canadians right now. That is why we would like to enhance the Canadian mortgage charter to make home ownership easier.

The budget also proposes to increase the home buyers' plan withdrawal limit from $35,000 to $60,000 for those saving for a down payment on their first home. This increase will enable first-time home buyers to use the tax benefits of an RRSP to save up to $25,000 more for their down payment. This enhanced version of the plan will operate alongside the tax-free first home savings account, or FHSA, which allows Canadians to make contributions of up to $8,000 annually and save up to $40,000 for their first down payment. I am pleased to note that over 750,000 Canadians have opened this type of savings account since it was launched only a year ago. Together, these two plans will make it easier to save for a down payment and will improve access to home ownership.

We also want to allow 30-year mortgage amortizations for first-time buyers of new builds, starting on August 1, 2024. We will enhance the Canadian mortgage charter, including expectations for permanent mortgage relief measures, where appropriate, to further assist those struggling with their mortgages. Also, to further assist first-time homebuyers, budget 2024 proposes that people who have withdrawn or will withdraw an amount from their HBP between January 1, 2022, and December 31, 2025, will be entitled to a three-year extended repayment grace period. These homebuyers will now have up to five years to begin the repayment process.

Our government has a plan to build more housing faster, make it more affordable, develop community housing sectors and make it easier to rent or buy a home.

[Todd Doherty, Conservative, Cariboo—Prince George, BC]

Madam Speaker, the government will now spend more money servicing our debt than it does on health care transfers.

Our hon. colleague spent a lot of time in her speech talking about youth. The leading cause of death for youth in my province of British Columbia is overdose. Would the government not be better off fighting overdose and the opioid crisis than spending billions on its failed drug policy?

[Anju Dhillon, Liberal, Dorval—Lachine—LaSalle, QC]

Madam Speaker, our government is investing in Canadians. We are investing in our youth. We are investing in the future for everybody. Part of this investment is also to fight against drug overdoses. Our government has invested significant funds to help fight this scourge on our society. We will continue to fight and to provide for Canadians, going as far and giving as much as we can.

[Alexis Brunelle-Duceppe, Bloc, Lac-Saint-Jean, QC]

Madam Speaker, I really enjoyed my colleague's speech.

It is clear that this budget is mostly about interfering in the jurisdictions of Quebec and the provinces.

Now, let us talk about something that strictly concerns the federal government. I am talking about tax evasion. We are often told that the government will seek to collect as much revenue as possible, yet tens of billions of dollars are being lost to government revenues because of tax evasion right here in Canada.

I have a very simple question for my colleague: What measure is in this budget to recover the money lost to tax evasion?

[Anju Dhillon, Liberal, Dorval—Lachine—LaSalle, QC]

Madam Speaker, I appreciate my colleague's question.

As he knows, many programs have been put in place to combat tax evasion. We will continue to work to prevent tax evasion so that everyone pays their fair share when it comes to paying taxes and contributing to Canadian society.

[Gord Johns, NDP, Courtenay—Alberni, BC]

Madam Speaker, here we are, on the eve of the Day of Mourning. Every year, we honour those who have died or been injured at work. I want to give a shout-out to United Steelworkers in Port Alberni, which hosted Sunday's event in my riding, as well as to the others from labour who hosted in communities in Courtenay and Parksville.

As we honour those workers, it is critical that we support workers who are injured. We know that if workers who have been injured in the workplace do not return to work within 12 months, they have a 1% chance of ever returning to work. Right now there are 1.2 million Canadian workers who are not working. We need to unlock their potential and support them by accommodating them when they are injured at work, to get them back to work immediately.

We have a historic program for returning to work through Pacific Coast University, a disability management program that the government started, but the government did not renew it. Is the government going to renew the disability management program with Pacific Coast University, or is it going to abandon workers?