Mr. Speaker, I am honoured to rise to follow up on the question I raised a couple of weeks ago in question period about the serious strain that our auto sector is under and the serious threat we are under.
Donald Trump has made it very clear that he wants to shutter the auto sector in this country. He wants to bring all the jobs that are here in Canada, the tens of thousands of direct and indirect jobs, down to the United States. We have seen, sadly, over the course of the last year, 5,000 job losses. It has been devastating for Brampton, for Oshawa and for Ingersoll. The list goes on. Parts manufacturers have laid employees off and have taken their jobs and moved them to the United States.
Here is an alarming number as to where the auto sector is today: In 2016, Canada built 2.3 million cars. Last year, that number dropped to 1.2 million. The number of cars being built in the country has been halved in the last decade. That is an alarming number and very dangerous when it comes to the threats that we face. What frustrates me very much is the latest Liberal plan, which they call their national auto strategy, that includes the EV rebates for vehicles under $50,000.
Donald Trump, in the midst of this unjustified, illegal and wrong tariff war that we are under right now, is tariffing every single Canadian vehicle made here and brought into the United States. That is wrong. It is unacceptable, and we are fighting back against that.
What is the Liberal strategy on this now? If we have an American-made EV that qualifies under that $50,000 threshold, that American EV, which is made in the United States, can get a subsidy to be built there and brought into Canada. That is absolutely ridiculous.
We are in the midst of a trade war. I do not accept for a second the industry minister's Liberal talking point that we are in an integrated North American auto sector. We are not now, when we have a President in the United States who is unjustifiably tariffing every single Canadian vehicle going into the United States. It requires forceful push-back against that, and that should not include giving subsidies to American-made EVs being moved into Canada.
Here is the reality. There is only one car made in Canada today that will qualify, the Dodge Charger. The last time the Liberals had the EV rebate, 99% of the EV rebates given were for foreign-made cars, including 31% from the United States.
My question to the Liberal government continues to be this: Why are we giving a penny of Canadian taxpayer money for any vehicle, any vehicle at all, being made in the United States and being brought into Canada when the President of the United States is tariffing every vehicle coming from Canada into the U.S.?
It makes no sense. It is the opposite of elbows up, and it needs to be scrapped. Will they do it?