Mr. Speaker, I must inform you that I will be sharing my time with the member for Mississauga—Lakeshore.
Tuesday's budget is aimed at building a strong and prosperous Canada. Basically, it comes down to three pillars: build, protect and empower.
Before I talk about the budget itself, I think it is very important to talk about the context this budget fits into. The reality is that the world changed a year ago in November 2024, when a new U.S. president was elected. That election triggered a reconfiguration of global trade. All the old rules governing trade between countries completely vanished overnight. This is making multilateral institutions weaker. Arbitrary, unfair, illegal tariffs are having a huge impact on the Canadian economy. They have reshaped supply chains, raising production costs and significantly slowing down economic growth in Canada and other parts of the world. In 2025, economic growth has slowed considerably around the globe, including in the United States.
Canada is being being dealt a double blow. We are being hit by increased costs due to tariffs, and we are also starting to feel the impact of a slowdown in U.S. demand. Canadian exporters are really starting to suffer. However, the takeaway from yesterday's conversation with the Governor of the Bank of Canada in committee is that, domestically, the Canadian economy is still performing relatively well. We are seeing weakness in external sectors and international trade, that is, exports. As we all know, 80% of Canadian exports go to the United States.
What we are seeing here is not a normal economic cycle in which we can expect a downturn to be followed by a recovery. This is a major structural shock. As our Prime Minister has said several times, things will never be the same again. We must meet this moment. We must meet it vigorously, and we must meet it now—not three years from now, not five years from now; now. Now is the time to respond to this radical change. Now is the time to overcome that external weakness.
That is why we are doing exactly what we said we would do. We will make massive investments in our economy to support and facilitate this transformation. The time is now. That is what we are going to do, not just because it is the right thing to do, but because we have the means to do it.
There has been a lot of talk in the House about the $78‑billion deficit. Members are saying that it is an enormous deficit, the worst since the Stone Age or who knows when. These are gross exaggerations. We are talking about $78 billion. When we talk about deficits, debts or many other economic and financial indicators, we always need to put them into perspective. We cannot talk about a $78‑billion deficit in the abstract. We always need to put it into perspective. In this case, we need to look at it in terms of the size of the economy. It is not 2010 or 2000 anymore. It is 2025. If we look at this supposedly enormous $78‑billion deficit in proportion to the size of the Canadian economy, we see that it amounts to just 2.5% of the GDP. Basically, it is one of the lowest deficits in the G7. We have the fiscal space to act, and we are acting forcefully and vigorously because massive intervention is required in the current circumstances.
The public debt is 42% of the GDP. Yes, we are talking about billions and billions of dollars and all of that, but in proportion to the size of the economy, the debt is 42% of the GDP. Once again, this level of debt is much lower than average. It is even below the G7 average.
What is more, since our friends are so fond of making comparisons and sharing what other agencies and stakeholders are doing, I would refer them to the most recent Moody's report, which was issued on October 31, just before budget day. Perhaps they are familiar with Moody's, the rating agency. On October 31, Moody's reaffirmed Canada's AAA credit rating and said that Canada was still financially strong, one of the strongest countries in the world.
We are not the basket cases. Come on, guys, wake up.