Madam Speaker, I have been around this place long enough to see a clear pattern of what a Liberal budget is, as well as the Liberals' omnibus budget implementation acts, which, of course, they promised not to use.
One might ask what exactly is the pattern of a Liberal budget. We have to go back to 2015 for a moment. What happened in 2015 is that the Prime Minister promised three years of so-called “modest” deficit spending budgets before he made a cast-in-stone promise to return to a balanced budget in 2019. One might ask what happened to that promise. In every one of those three years, the Prime Minister spent considerably more than he promised he would.
In 2019, he did not even attempt to honour his so-called cast-in-stone promise to return Canada to a balanced budget. In other words, the Liberal Prime Minister did not even try to do what he promised he would. Why even make the promise at all to return to a balanced budget if he had zero intention of doing so? It is because, of course, making promises on things he has no intention of ever honouring is basically a hallmark character trait of the Prime Minister.
Where are we today with this latest Liberal 2024 budget? We are now at a total spending of $535 billion for the 2024-25 fiscal year. Let us pause for a moment to recap.
The 2022 so-called “return to fiscal responsibility” budget was $434 billion. Here we are in the 2024 budget, and the proposed spending is up to $535 billion. This means that this latest Liberal budget proposes to spend $100 billion more than what the Liberals themselves labelled as a “return to fiscal responsibility” budget just a short time ago. Let us not forget that before the pandemic began in 2019-20, the Liberals were spending around $338 billion. We went from $338 billion to now $535 billion. That is an increase of almost $200 billion in annual spending. Let us not kid ourselves. Everyone knows the Liberals will spend more than the $535 billion they are proposing, more so given that next year is an election year.
Now we can all see the pattern to Liberal budgets that I mentioned earlier. Every year we are told what will happen, but it never actually comes to pass. The forecasts, the promises, everything the Liberals promise ends up being completely false. They do not even try to live within the fiscal limits they propose for themselves. Most offensive of all is that the Prime Minister's Office has the audacity to label this budget as the “fairness for every generation” budget. I am literally aghast by this.
The 2024 “fairness for every generation” budget proposes a $40-billion deficit for this fiscal year alone. We know that this is not the case. The finance department has said that the government is billions over that particular projection already. This is noteworthy because the Liberals' previous debt forecasts were at $35 billion for 2024-25 and $26.8 billion for 2025-26. That is a big difference we see between $40 billion and the $27 billion or so they had previously said for 2025.
We all know that the cost of servicing the national debt has exceeded the federal spending on health care. This is what the Liberals call fairness for everyone. It is not unlike the capital gains increase. The Liberals will tell us that this tax impacts only Canada's most wealthy, yet we have heard from many everyday Canadians who, through a divorce, a health crisis, retirement or otherwise, are in a one-time situation where they might be looking at paying a once-in-a-lifetime capital gains tax. These are doctors, small business owners, people in the trades. Larry the plumber from Winnipeg was brought up today, who is working hard. None of these people are so-called ultrawealthy, but they will all be hit hard by this latest Liberal tax grab. The Liberals know that these people exist and also know that the Liberal tax grab will hit them hard. However, they would still look them in the eye and say that only the ultrawealthy would be impacted by this.
I do not know if anyone on the Liberal or NDP side of the House realizes how angry people become when they believe they are being deceived and misled by their own government. Make no mistake: They are not happy with the Prime Minister. He needs that extra tax grab for fairness, he says. Let us talk about fairness for a moment.
There is now an entire generation of young Canadians who are left out despite all the Liberal spending. Literally, this problem is so bad that even the Prime Minister himself openly admits that young people now feel like they cannot get ahead in the same way their parents or grandparents could. However, it is much worse than that. The Prime Minister is leaving future generations of Canadians with record levels of debt and no plan whatsoever to return to a balanced budget, ever. The Prime Minister has failed in every single budget to do what he promised he would do in the budget the year previous. He just spends more, and we go further into debt. That is not fairness.
Before I close, I would like to share something with this place. We, of course, spend a portion of our time in this place debating budgets and budget implementation acts. A sitting government hopes to table a budget that resonates with Canadians. As all experienced parliamentarians will know, some budgets resonate more than others, and some, very little at all. This particular budget has not been like most. I do not recall at any time so many different citizens coming forward in opposition to a budget as they are for this budget, and by extension the budget implementation act. I make a point of reading every email, returning every phone call and scheduling as many meeting requests as I can. I can tell every member of this place that this particular budget is not impacting many Canadians the way the Liberal government would have us believe. The Liberals may call this a “fairness for every generation” budget, but many I hear from see this budget as being anything but fair to them.
I am not one to follow polls, so it does not surprise me at all that so many different polls show this budget, like the Liberal government, as falling down so badly. I would submit that this is without a doubt an unfair budget for many Canadians. I will be joining with those Canadians who now say “enough is enough” in rejecting the Prime Minister, his desperation budgets and this flawed budget implementation act.
I have one final point before I conclude my comments this evening. Earlier today, I read a report from the National Post, and the headline said it all: “Airplane food cost more than $220K on [the Prime Minister]'s Indo-Pacific trip: Meals included beef brisket with mashed parsley potatoes with truffle oil, braised lamb shanks and baked cheesecake with pistachio brittle”.
When the Prime Minister and his finance minister lecture others about fairness and needing people to do a little more, why is it that the Prime Minister never does his part? The reason is that the Prime Minister is always above these rules. Why does the Prime Minister consistently make demands upon others that he himself fails to follow? Canadians are tired of this. In my riding, as I am sure in many other members' in this place, people want an election and they do not want this budget or this budget implementation act. That is why I will be opposing it.
I would like to thank all members of this place for taking the time to hear my comments today.