Mr. Speaker, I was having such a good day until you told me I would be interrupted for question period, but democracy cannot wait.
It is always a pleasure to rise on behalf of the people of Kamloops—Thompson—Nicola. Being in the House, I see many people in the gallery. I am not allowed to point out the firefighters and fire chiefs who may be present, so I just thank them for being present in Ottawa. This includes my own fire chief, though I would not be able to say whether I see him. I met with Mr. Ken Uzeloc earlier. Whether Chief Uzeloc is watching or not, I thank him and I thank all of the fire chiefs who bravely keep us safe.
Today, we are talking about the budget implementation act, Bill C-15. If someone were to ask how the budget implementation act works as opposed to the budget, I would say the budget is a forecast but then we have to actually implement it. Interestingly enough, I was at the SECU committee, which is colloquially called the public safety committee. There, we were talking about CBSA officers because the government promised 1,000 new CBSA officers in April. They said elbows up and that they were going to get them.
I have asked many times where those officers are. Have the Liberals hired any of them? The answer is always no. Today, we heard 57 officers were hired. I asked how many of those 57 officers were hired pursuant to the promise and I was told to look at the budget. The budget implementation act has not passed, so if the money is earmarked for those officers and the government has not brought the spending authority forward, I am not sure if any of them have. It is obviously something to look at. Generally, when we have the president of the CBSA or the commissioner of corrections come to committee, we expect them to know their numbers, so I was disappointed at that.
I was also disappointed when the Prime Minister told young people they would have to make sacrifices. I have children. They are still young; they are not adults yet. I worry about their futures. I still remember when I bought my first house and thought about how far stretched I would be for that house. My wife and I had both just graduated law school. We were making first-year lawyer incomes. A lot of people do not realize the income is not as high as one might expect. We were making money sufficient to pay our bills and we bought our first house in 2008. That house is now double the price it once was as an entry-level home.
When the Prime Minister talks about young people making sacrifices, it is very easy for somebody who is fortunate enough to be an MP, to be very wealthy or to be even marginally wealthy to say they have to sacrifice. It reminds me of when the former prime minister, Justin Trudeau, said veterans were asking for more than we could give. It was awful. We need to be taking care of the people who take care of us. It is not lost on me that we have first responders here, yet we send our money everywhere but to the people on the ground.
Where are the houses? I was stopped in the airport two days ago by people in my riding of Kamloops—Thompson—Nicola who talked about how low housing starts are. If we listen to any of the ministers on the front benches, we would want to do cartwheels based on how great the economy is, but I do not listen to the people on the front benches. I listen to people in my riding. If we want to know whether something is working, we talk to the people on the ground. Frankly, I think I can speak for my Conservative colleagues when I say we have had enough of people in ivory towers telling us that we have never had it so good. People in my riding are lined up at the food bank.