House of Commons Hansard #343 of the 44th Parliament, 1st Session. (The original version is on Parliament's site.) The word of the day was conservative.
Procedure and House AffairsCommittees of the HouseRoutine Proceedings
The Speaker Greg Fergus
Pursuant to Standing Order 91.1(2), the report is deemed adopted.
It is my duty, pursuant to Standing Order 38 to inform the House that the questions to be raised tonight at the time of adjournment are as follows: the hon. member for Edmonton—Wetaskiwin, Finance; the hon. member for Spadina—Fort York, Immigration, Refugees and Citizenship; the hon. member for Courtenay—Alberni, Health.
Marty Morantz Conservative Charleswood—St. James—Assiniboia—Headingley, MB
Mr. Speaker, I move that the 16th report of the Standing Committee on Finance, presented to the House on Monday, February 26, be concurred in.
I will be sharing my time with my amazing colleague, the member for Central Okanagan—Similkameen—Nicola.
What an honour it is to rise on behalf of my constituents, the great people of Charleswood—St. James—Assiniboia—Headingley. Every day I come here, I think about what we can do as members of Parliament to make their lives just a bit better.
It is also an honour for me to serve as a member of the Standing Committee on Finance, where I have been for the most part since I was elected in 2019, with a brief stint along the way as a member of the foreign affairs committee. The members of the finance committee serve a vital role as the only opposition party focused on holding the Liberal government to account.
People are suffering across this land from coast to coast to coast after nine years of the most incompetent and out-of-touch government in Canadian history. That is why I think it is very important to point out the extraordinary display of hypocrisy we just saw unfold in the chamber.
Just two weeks ago, in the throes of the Elmwood—Transcona by-election, the leader of the NDP rose to his feet in front of the cameras, held up a copy of the coalition agreement and said that he was ripping it up and that he was done with the Prime Minister. He said that it was over and that the gloves were off. I cannot help but think that the New Democrats thought they were going to lose the by-election. They knew the Liberals were dragging them down, and so the leader stood up in front of the cameras and said that he was ripping up the coalition agreement.
FinanceCommittees of the HouseRoutine Proceedings
The Assistant Deputy Speaker Carol Hughes
There seem to be conversations going on. I am not sure what those conversations are about, but I would ask members to please have them outside the chamber, because they are interrupting the proceedings.
The hon. member has the floor.
Marty Morantz Conservative Charleswood—St. James—Assiniboia—Headingley, MB
Madam Speaker, the extraordinary display of hypocrisy that just occurred in the House has never before been seen on a level like that in the history of this country and in the history of this austere chamber.
What happened? The leader of the NDP knew he was going down. We had a great candidate. I was at doors with him many times. Colin Reynolds is a construction electrician, a guy on the executive of his local IBEW union board who grew up in the area and who really connected with the residents.
The leader of the NDP knew he was going to lose the by-election. What did he do? He said that he was ripping up the agreement and that he was done with the Prime Minister. Unfortunately, the people of Elmwood—Transcona deserve better. They deserve better than having the leader of the NDP try to fool them into thinking he is a man of principle. He is not, and that was established today. In front of the entire country, the man who said he was ripping up the agreement got up, taped it back together and said that he believes in the Prime Minister and is voting with him. In fact, he said he has confidence in the Prime Minister.
The height of hypocrisy is on a level never, ever before seen on the floor of the chamber. Canadians will not forget it, and the people of Elmwood—Transcona will not forget it come the next election.
Regarding the issue of the report, as I said, I sit on the committee. Conservatives really are the only members on the committee who are doing their best to hold the government to account. We had some great ideas for the report that our colleagues from other parties on the committee would not support. Therefore, for the people watching, I will explain that we attached a dissenting report to the report, which we are allowed to do. Anyone can look it up online and read the dissenting report. I want to go through some parts of it, but before I do, I want to just circle back for a second to look at part of the Liberal government's record.
In 2015, in order to fool Canadians into voting for him, the Prime Minister promised to balance the budget by 2019. Of course that never happened. In fact he doubled the national debt in nine years. It is hard to get one's head around that, but just to put it in perspective, in 2015, when the Prime Minister first was elected to office, the national debt was $616 billion. Today it is over $1.2 trillion. The Prime Minister has gone more in debt than all other prime ministers from 1867 to today combined.
Today the interest on the debt is $52 billion a year, which is more than we spend on health care, more than we spend on defence and in fact more than we actually collect in the GST. It is important for people watching to know that when they go out and buy something in the store and the store adds on the GST, that money is going directly to paying the interest on the massive, historic debt that the Prime Minister has managed to rack up.
Therefore at committee, Conservatives made a number of common-sense recommendations that were rejected by the NDP and Liberal members. One of the recommendations we made, which we had hoped would be a recommendation in the report, was to axe the carbon tax. The reason we wanted to axe the carbon tax is pretty straightforward, and I will go through some of those points. For example, the Governor of the Bank of Canada, Tiff Macklem, came to committee and told us that the carbon taxes are inflationary and that by cutting the carbon tax, inflation would come down by 0.6%, bringing the CPI back into the bank's target range.
The government has an opportunity now to start with the carbon tax on farmers. The common-sense Conservative bill, Bill C-234, should be passed immediately in its original form to take the tax off farmers to help lower food prices. I know it has been said many times in the House, but when one taxes the farmer who produces the food, taxes the trucker who ships the food and taxes the grocer who stocks the food, the food costs more. What is the result? It is two million Canadians lining up at food banks, and a historic number of homeless encampments across this country.
Earlier this year, as part of the finance committee's housing study, Mayor Cam Guthrie from Guelph was a witness. He was elected in 2014. I asked Mayor Guthrie how many homeless encampments there were in Guelph the year he was elected. He said there were zero. I asked how many there are today, and he said there are 20. That is just one example.
I made a speech about this the other day in the House and went through the litany of housing-hell stories across this country as a result of the apocalyptic, historically terrible housing policies of the Liberal government. With $82 billion on the national housing strategy, never before has so much been spent to achieve so little.
It is time to axe the failed and inflationary carbon tax that makes gas, groceries and home heating more expensive, and to bring down inflation so Canadians can once again earn powerful paycheques so they can afford nutritious food and a home in a safe neighbourhood. It seems like a simple ask, part of the Canadian dream, but that dream has been broken by the failed policies of the Liberal government.
We said to axe the tax, and we also talked about building more homes. There is a housing crisis in this country. There is an affordability crisis, and we need to build millions of homes. However, the Liberals and the NDP voted against our common-sense Conservative bill, the building homes, not bureaucracy act, a bill that would have gotten houses built. Instead they just got in the way. They are the gatekeepers of the House of Commons, and they got in the way of a common-sense bill that would have helped Canadians. Of course, we also need to fix the budget and stop the crime. Let us bring it home.
FinanceCommittees of the HouseRoutine Proceedings
September 25th, 2024 / 5:30 p.m.
York Centre Ontario
Liberal
Ya'ara Saks LiberalMinister of Mental Health and Addictions and Associate Minister of Health
Madam Speaker, as we are listening, the Conservatives never miss the opportunity to actually work for Canadians. We were supposed to be discussing Bill C-71 tonight, which is about lost Canadians. When the Conservatives were in power, they actually stripped the ability of Canadians to retain or gain their citizenship. I wanted to debate the bill tonight because it would affect my daughter, who was born abroad but has lived here all of her life; it might actually ensure that her children have Canadian citizenship.
I would ask the member this: Why is it that we have to hear the same slogans over and over again rather than do the work we are doing on this side of the House for Canadians?
Marty Morantz Conservative Charleswood—St. James—Assiniboia—Headingley, MB
Madam Speaker, I will agree with the member. At one point she said that Conservatives never cease to work for Canadians. In fact, that is absolutely correct. We will never cease to work for Canadians, and that is exactly what we are doing right now.
I will take no lessons from a member who literally was holding hands with Mahmoud Abbas in Ramallah less than a year ago, after what happened on October 7, 2023.
Gabriel Ste-Marie Bloc Joliette, QC
Madam Speaker, I congratulate my colleague for his speech in the House and all the work he does on the Standing Committee on Finance.
We are talking about the prebudget consultation report tabled in February of this year, after which the government tabled its budget.
Does my colleague feel that the budget the government tabled in the spring was well rooted in the consultations we held and the report we presented to the government?
Marty Morantz Conservative Charleswood—St. James—Assiniboia—Headingley, MB
Madam Speaker, as I said, Conservatives tabled a dissenting report, and that report was based on testimony we heard from many witnesses at committee who said that the carbon tax was just a terrible policy that was making life harder for everyone, that we needed to take tangible steps to build more homes, that the budget was out of control, and in fact that the budgetary spending was the actual cause of spiking inflation and making everything more expensive for everyone. We heard testimony saying that we needed to bring in things like mandatory minimum sentences and consecutive sentences in order to help stem the tide of crime in this country.
Those things are in a dissenting report for the very reason my colleague mentioned, which is that our colleagues in the Liberal and NDP parties on the committee would not agree to listen to what the witnesses said.
FinanceCommittees of the HouseRoutine Proceedings
The Assistant Deputy Speaker Carol Hughes
The hon. Minister for Mental Health and Addictions is rising on a point of order.
Ya'ara Saks Liberal York Centre, ON
Madam Speaker, I would like to raise a matter of personal privilege with regard to the member's comments about the government work that I did abroad. I am a Canadian citizen and an Israeli citizen; I have dedicated 30 years of my life to peacebuilding and he took a—
FinanceCommittees of the HouseRoutine Proceedings
The Assistant Deputy Speaker Carol Hughes
This is more a point of debate than it is a matter of privilege.
The hon. member for Courtenay—Alberni is rising on a point of order.
Gord Johns NDP Courtenay—Alberni, BC
Madam Speaker, actually, the minister has a point. My colleague simply asked the member a question in relation to what he said on the floor of the House of Commons, and he took the time to insult her. That is totally unacceptable. He should be apologizing to the House.
FinanceCommittees of the HouseRoutine Proceedings
The Assistant Deputy Speaker Carol Hughes
This is all part of debate. I want to remind members to be careful on the wording of what they are saying in the House. This has caused a bit of disorder.
Questions and comments, the hon. member for Courtenay—Alberni.
Gord Johns NDP Courtenay—Alberni, BC
Madam Speaker, my colleague talked about the by-election in Elmwood—Transcona. He talked about small business people. For seven years, the NDP led the charge to cap credit card merchant fees and forced the government to do something. The Conservatives sat silent for seven years while small business people paid some of the highest credit card fees in the world. Leila Dance, who won in Elmwood—Transcona, ran the Transcona business improvement association. The reason she won is that small business people saw right through the Conservatives, who are actually just there for big corporations.
Why were the Conservatives silent and standing up for Visa and Mastercard instead of small business owners in this country?
Marty Morantz Conservative Charleswood—St. James—Assiniboia—Headingley, MB
Madam Speaker, that is pretty rich from this member. His party voted with a government that spiked inflation higher than it has ever been before, quicker than has ever happened before, and this has made everything more expensive. As much as they like to talk about how inflation has come down to the 2% target, the damage has been done. Everything is more expensive. Good on him for taking on credit card interest, but the reality is that the policies he supported were seriously detrimental to affordability in this country. Canadians are suffering now because of that.
Dan Albas Conservative Central Okanagan—Similkameen—Nicola, BC
Madam Speaker, it is always a pleasure and an honour to rise on behalf of the good people of Central Okanagan—Similkameen—Nicola, and I am very proud to be sharing this time with the previous member.
The Standing Committee on Finance has a very important job. In fact, it is a rare committee because, in our Standing Orders, it actually says that the finance committee must travel and hear widely from Canadians as it does its deliberations. As we have heard from the leader of Canada's common-sense Conservatives, Canada has a problem. We have a gatekeeper economy, which means that there are many people who are seeking prosperity and opportunity, but they cannot do so because of the various gatekeepers that are closing in. I was previously a member of the finance committee, and we would sometimes travel to remote locations to hear testimony. I took great pride in the effort to do so.
One of the key problems we have is that the average citizen does not have a lobbyist here in Ottawa. Oftentimes, lobbyists are the ones coming to the finance committee, and the number one recommendation they always make is to spend more money. When we talk about the costly coalition of a mainly NDP-Liberal government, sometimes supported by the Bloc, it is because there is never a dollar for which they could not find something to spend it on.
Let us hearken back to the first majority the government had. The President of the Treasury Board at the time said they were going to do a spending review. From the spending review, they found that they needed to spend more money. That is the kind of situation we have: There is no leadership or priority except to spend others' money. When I speak about this issue, I often say of the government that Ottawa has a spending problem; it does not have a revenue problem. Nevertheless, there is not a tax that the government will not look to increase. Every April 1, we see a hodgepodge of different taxes, starting with the carbon tax. It does not matter what province one is from; with the exception of Quebec, we see the NDP-Liberal government raising the carbon tax again every April 1. In fact, if we go to the B.C. NDP government's own budget documents, on page 75, they actually say that the federal government is responsible for having to raise the carbon tax.
I want to take a quick moment to point out that the member for Foothills has asked the government about carbon tax 1 and carbon tax 2. Yes, we have ended up with a series of regulations. Of course, they have been fully costed by both the government and the parliamentary budget office. By the government's own analysis, when each respective tax is combined, it is a tax on the economy of up to, if not higher than, $40 billion per year.
Let us be mindful that the leader of the NDP has always advocated for more taxes to come to Ottawa. He has talked about not supporting carbon taxes, but we shall see; he also talked about not supporting the Liberal Prime Minister anymore. In fact, he famously tore up the agreement for confidence and supply. He said that the Prime Minister should not be Prime Minister. However, the NDP leader came to this place today, and what did he and his caucus do? They supported the government. It will be really interesting to see what happens next April 1, when we have such things as the carbon tax and excise tax on alcohol set to increase. We will see what happens at that particular juncture.
I am going to go back to the gatekeeping economy, the lobbyists and whatnot. The lobbyists always come and they present something. When I speak to my constituents, they say that they are barely able to keep up with what they have, including affording nutritious food. Sylvain Charlebois, the food professor at Dalhousie, has said that people are making the very difficult choice between food's nutrition and cost, and they are siding more with the cost.
We should be concerned that many of our constituents are going to food banks because they cannot afford to pay their carbon tax, their income tax and all the taxes the government continues to raise. Who speaks for those people? They do not have a lobbyist. We are supposed to speak for them. We are the ones who are ultimately responsible for either giving the government supply or denying it.
We had a confidence vote today where we saw both the Bloc and the NDP side with the Liberal government. I believe we need to be looking more to our constituents rather than the recommendations of lobbyists who show up at the finance committee and others. We also need to consider that the average John Smith or Jane Doe is facing critical shortages of housing, especially if they are younger.
The Liberal government has said during every single fall economic update and every budget that it will address that. It has not. It has not addressed such things as chronic homelessness or the fact that young people cannot get into the market, even when they save and scrimp to get there. Liberals keep talking about all the different programs they offer and how that is going to alleviate the issues in the system. However, going back to that gatekeeper economy, we have city councillors who are choosing not to build housing in sufficient quantities in many municipalities, particularly in those large urban centres and census metropolitan areas.
Housing demand has only gone up because of the policies of the government. If there is a massive demand for housing and we continue to allow gatekeepers, such as municipal councils, to basically stop the investment of new housing, that is going to create an affordability challenge and a crisis. In B.C., in the past year, we have seen housing starts drop by 34%.
Government members, and politicians who support them, constantly talk about the housing crisis, yet there is very little discussion about putting pressure on municipalities. In fact, the government's own so-called housing accelerator, which I called a slush fund for municipalities, is essentially allowing municipalities to not increase housing stock by writing them cheques. This happens even in part of my riding in Kelowna. The housing accelerator plan talks about how they can actually invest the dollars they are given from it into such things as bike lanes, bridges and sewers.
There is no onus on the City of Kelowna to help build a single house. There is not an actual commitment for that. This is the problem: We have a government that fails to acknowledge that municipal councils are those gatekeepers. Instead of putting up a set of incentives that actually reward those that are building and punish those that are not, they have essentially written out blank cheques to these municipalities. They have also been picking winners and choosers. I know the City of West Kelowna, the District of Summerland and the District of Peachland all applied for the same funding and did not get anywhere with the government.
This scattershot approach is not working and, again, I want to focus on those young people. All of us here love this country; I really believe that we do. The problem is, if we continue to deliver the same kind of results, those young people are going to feel alienated. They are either going to opt out and not vote or vote for very extreme choices.
The member for Carleton, as I have said before, has been adamant that he and our party would build the homes. On this concurrence debate, we need to discuss more about axing the tax. We need to build more homes. I wish I could get to fixing the budget and stopping the crime but I am running out of time. I am looking forward to questions in the chamber.
Kevin Lamoureux LiberalParliamentary Secretary to the Leader of the Government in the House of Commons
Madam Speaker, sadly, the Conservative Party continues to want to play the game of filibustering, at significant expense. The people the Conservative Party is penalizing by this behaviour are Canadians. Canadians are feeling the impact of a Conservative opposition party that continues to feel entitled, to thirst for power and to filibuster government legislation to the degree it will not even allow it to go to committee.
Does the member not recognize that the official opposition has a role to play, that it also can help Canadians?
Dan Albas Conservative Central Okanagan—Similkameen—Nicola, BC
Madam Speaker, we do not agree with the government's agenda. It is called a democracy when people can disagree. I would also disagree with the whole statement that the government thinks it has the right issues today.
My constituents are talking about unaffordability and being able to pay their bills. They want to see us axe the tax. They also want to hear us talk about housing. It is politicians who say there is a crisis and then do nothing about it. In fact, they talk about other things.
The common-sense Conservatives are the party that will axe the tax, build the homes, fix the budget and stop the crime. Those are the priorities of my constituents.
Gabriel Ste-Marie Bloc Joliette, QC
Madam Speaker, I have had the pleasure of working with my colleague for many months on the Standing Committee on Finance.
At the beginning of his speech, my colleague criticized the fact that the government is a big spender. In my opinion, what it spends the most on is support for the fossil fuel industry, including oil and gas and the oil sands. We can talk about the Trans Mountain pipeline, which cost $34 billion, but we can also talk about the Minister of Finance's plan, which will cost $83 billion. This includes, among other things, carbon capture and nuclear plants in the oil sands to make hydrogen from the gas saved. That is $83 billion on top of the $34 billion.
Does my hon. colleague believe, as I do, that these expenses should be reduced?
Dan Albas Conservative Central Okanagan—Similkameen—Nicola, BC
Madam Speaker, I support a policy where the government is collecting the right amount of taxes.
For example, the member, at finance committee, raised legitimate questions about the so-called luxury tax, a tax on workers. We actually had industry come and say the tax will harm industry and will push business to the United States and other places. That is a policy I 100% agree with the Bloc Québécois on.
I also suggest he look at energy in the west, particularly the natural gas in my home province of British Columbia. We could be doing good things on the environment and the economy. We could be helping to displace dirty coal right across the world.
These are some of the things we should have discussions about, and I hope we will with this gentleman and his party in the future.
Don Davies NDP Vancouver Kingsway, BC
Madam Speaker, my hon. colleague spoke about the number one issue for his constituents being affordability. That is the same issue I have heard about from constituents in my riding of Vancouver Kingsway. We come from the same province.
The NDP has addressed that in a number of ways. One was by bringing in dental care for nine million people so it would no longer be the case that they spend thousands of dollars on dental care out of their pockets. We also brought in pharmacare, and diabetes medication. I have talked to many people who have to spend thousands of dollars every year on diabetes medications and devices.
Can the member explain to us, if he is truly concerned about affordability, why he and his party voted against those two measures, which take thousands of dollars of expenses off some of the lowest-income Canadians and would obviously ease their affordability issues? Why did he oppose that?
Dan Albas Conservative Central Okanagan—Similkameen—Nicola, BC
Madam Speaker, I will give the member a practical example. My understanding is that, in the Similkameen and in Penticton proper, there have not been any sign-ups for a dentist. Maybe there has been one now, but the NDP is touting this program as being widely available and accessible to people. I have had people in Kelowna tell me they have tried to go to a different dentist, but the new dentist requires a number of X-rays that cost hundreds of dollars. They cannot afford that.
This member may believe his own rhetoric, but when we actually talk to the people trying to access the so-called dental program, we hear they cannot. It is smoke and mirrors. Many people phone me specifically because they know I am a Conservative and they want that feedback heard on the House of Commons floor.
Kevin Lamoureux LiberalParliamentary Secretary to the Leader of the Government in the House of Commons
Madam Speaker, I am hoping to be able to address the motion as liberally as both the mover and the seconder have, in terms of being all over the place regarding the government agenda and some of the things the Conservative Party of Canada would like to be able to do.
We just finished having a confidence vote. The Conservatives, in their great hunger for power, will do whatever it takes, period, end of story, to get what they want, not necessarily what Canadians want but what the leadership of the Conservative Party wants. It is unfortunate, because there is a substantial cost to the behaviour we are witnessing day in and day out from the Conservative Party. Its single focus is nothing more than to cause an election.
Fortunately, other political entities in the House of Commons recognize we are not here to serve the Conservative Party. We are here to serve and provide for Canadians in all regions of our country. In the last election, all parties were given a mandate, and that mandate was to work co-operatively in looking for ways to provide the supports that Canadians want and expect, not only the government of the day, the Liberals, but also the New Democrats, members of the Bloc and, in fact, Conservative members of the House of Commons.
The Conservative Party has been consistent since day one after the last federal election. One only needs to look at the actions Conservatives have taken. It was greatly amplified over the summer, to the degree that they are even getting a little giddy, I would suggest. Unfortunately, adding to that giddiness, some serious issues are flowing out of the leader of the Conservative Party's office, and that really concerns a lot of Canadians.
We have witnessed a Conservative Party shift to the extreme right. We have even seen Progressive Conservative prime ministers be exceptionally critical of the new Reform-Conservative party we see today.