Debates of Feb. 26th, 2026

Budget 2025 Implementation Act, No. 1

[Kelly McCauley, Conservative, Edmonton West, AB]

Mr. Speaker, I am very pleased to rise again on Bill C-15.

Before I start, I will mention that I am sharing my time with my Edmonton neighbour, the member for St. Albert—Sturgeon River.

There is a lot to cover in Bill C-15. It is another omnibus budget bill from the government, covering about 75 different pieces of legislation. Obviously, in just 10 minutes, I cannot get into everything. I would love to talk more about the massive debt it would be adding. I would love to talk about the added deficit and the current finance minister. We like to tease him because he stands in the House all the time, yelling at the top of his lungs that he will “take no lessons from the Conservatives.” I just wish he would take lessons from the previous finance minister, who delivered a deficit that was $40 billion lower than the current finance minister and actually resigned over it. Perhaps he could take some lessons from her on how to deliver a proper budget.

I am going to cover a few themes today, mostly around openness, following the rules and just being honest with Canadians about the budget. The first issue is openness.

King Edward I, when calling the model Parliament, and I call him the godfather of the estimates process, stated, “What touches all should be approved by all, and it is also clear that common dangers should be met with measures agreed upon in common.” This is basically the whole purpose behind Parliament in general and, also, the estimates process.

In the most recent estimates, the supplementary estimates (C) just came out. For those at home wondering what the estimates are, estimates are, basically, like writing the cheque for something. We can compare it to someone's rent at home; they know that at the end of the month, they will have to budget for $2,000, or perhaps $3,000 under the Liberal government. They have to budget for $3,000 at the end of the month to pay the rent. That is the budget. Cutting the actual cheque is the estimates process, the actual paying for that.

In the supplementary estimates (C), which is the government coming to Parliament looking for approval of spending, the government has in the Treasury Board $1 billion under what is called the vote 50 for, ostensibly, defence spending. There is no explanation of what this $1 billion is for. The Liberals are basically coming to Parliament and saying, “Give us $1 billion, and we'll tell you about it later.”

We just heard in the operations committee earlier today that we will not know what the government spent the $1 billion on until the public accounts come out over a year from now. We will not get the details of what the $1 billion is for for about 18 months.

This came up years ago, in 2018, when the Liberal government brought forward the vote 40 slush fund scandal. The Liberals came to Parliament saying, “We need $15 billion. Approve it in advance, but we are not going to tell you what it's for. We'll tell you after the fact.”

When we pressed it on this, we were told by the government that it was presumptuous of parliamentarians to ask what the money is for before approving it. Here we have it again. The government can say it is for defence spending, but the Liberals are so sclerotic in their defence procurement, it boggles the mind that they would put out the supplementary estimates saying, “Give us a billion now. It's desperately needed now. We don't know what it's for right now, but give it to us so we can spend it immediately.”

It takes 10 years for these guys to procure a simple pistol for the army and seven years to procure knapsacks. We were able to prosecute the Second World War in a shorter period than it took the Liberal government to procure knapsacks, and yet somehow it needs the $1 billion approved now without telling us what it is for.

It does not stop there. The main estimates that came out, which was the approval for the coming year, had another $1 billion. The Liberals want $2 billion of taxpayers' money approved by Parliament, and they will not tell us what it is for. We reached out to the Department of Defence, asking what this money is for, and it said it does not know either. It did not have the details of what the $2 billion would be for, but the government says, “Give it to us now.”

It is the same issue with Canada Post. The government lent it $1 billion, and in the most recent estimates, it has asked for $1 billion more, so $2 billion.

We know that Canada Post is in trouble. For five years running, the government has refused Canada Post's annual submission for its strategic plan to address the structural problems going on with Canada Post. The government ignored it for political reasons, and now it is saying it has to spend taxpayers' money to bail Canada Post out with a loan.

The Kaplan report on Canada Post states that one would need a “complete suspension of disbelief” to believe that Canada Post will ever return this money. The Canada Post Corporation Act, 32(2) says that writeoffs for such a loan must show in the very next set of estimates. Those are the estimates that came out today, and there is nothing. The government is now coming back to us and saying that it will not show the writeoffs until supplementary estimates (C), which will come out a year from now.

Even though Canada Post has burned through the first $1 billion and will not return it, it has asked for a second billion. We know from the Kaplan report that it will not be repaid, but the government is not being honest with Canadians about this loan and the fact that it will be a writeoff.

That is all I am asking: Make it a policy. That would be fine. We could debate the policy, but be honest with parliamentarians and Canadians about where the money is going.

I have asked repeatedly that the government follow the rules. We actually have rules around government spending on advertising, as well as internal Treasury Board rules about how the government writes up its communication. We are right now debating Bill C-15 for a budget called “Canada Strong”. It is right on the budget itself. This is the exact wording of the Liberals' campaign slogan. This is right from the Treasury Board guidelines. These are not my guidelines:

In the context of all Government of Canada communications products and activities, non-partisan means:

objective, factual and explanatory;

Good luck getting objective from the Liberals, and I would say the same thing about “factual”. It continues:

free from political party slogans

The Liberals actually wrote their party slogan as the budget. Again, I just ask the government to follow the rules.

The public accounts is the accounting of last fiscal year's spending. Last fiscal year is before the current Prime Minister became Prime Minister. The Liberal government wrote in the public accounts, on page 8, for those following at home, “The government is moving toward a new capital budgeting approach that distinguishes its day-to-day operational spending.... [This] budgeting framework will improve transparency”.

The government wrote, in last year's accounts, propaganda for the current policy. Public accounts end on March 31 of the previous year, but the Liberals are talking about future government policy. They wrote, “the elimination of the...carbon tax on fuel products further contributed to lower inflation in early 2025.” The carbon tax was cancelled April 1, but the public accounts ran up to March 31. Again, the government is violating Treasury Board rules.

We confronted the deputy minister about this. He said he would not have anything else to say on it. We further pressed the assistant deputy minister, Evelyn Dancey, and she spent time trying to explain that the low growth shown in the budget does not reflect all the great work being done by the current government, even though, of course, the Bank of Canada also shows the same lack of growth. Here we have assistant department heads shilling for the government and violating Treasury Board rules.

We just ask for transparency, for parliamentarians to be given the information so we can vote properly, and for the Liberals to follow the rules the government itself sets out to protect democracy and the rights of parliamentarians.

[Kevin Lamoureux, Liberal, Parliamentary Secretary to the Leader of the Government in the House of Commons]

Mr. Speaker, it is interesting that the member says, “Follow the rules.” He might want to reflect on his own leader and the advertising he did. In fact, one incident was brought to the Conflict of Interest and Ethics Commissioner. The minister at the time, the leader of the Conservative Party, was found guilty, that is with respect to following the rules.

Yes, there has been a great deal ambition and progress on many different fronts. The member cited, for example, the investment in the Canadian military. I could go from the major projects to major pieces of legislation, all forms of activities, and I would suggest that we have probably done more in less than a year than Harper did in 10 years.

Does the member opposite believe that the government is going too fast for him to keep up?

[Kelly McCauley, Conservative, Edmonton West, AB]

Mr. Speaker, whenever I need a moment of comedy or mirth in the House, I can always count on the member for Winnipeg North to deliver it.

It is ridiculous. Only the Liberal government would say, “Give us $2 billion so we can hurry up spending for military. Oh, by the way, don't look at our record of taking seven years to buy knapsacks. Don't look at our record of taking over 10 years to buy handguns. Don't look at our record of delays around the shipbuilding project, and don't look at our record of incompetence and interference with Irving Shipbuilding and the supply ship debacle, but give us the money, and you can worry about it later.”

The member should get on board and understand what Parliament is about. It is about approving expenditure, not writing corrupt Liberals a blank cheque.

[William Stevenson, Conservative, Yellowhead, AB]

Mr. Speaker, I have a question regarding whether my colleague thinks it is incompetence or actually skullduggery in the Liberals' trying to get the money without actually coming up with the ideas and the transparency of where the numbers are.

The Liberals want to keep producing the GST break for first-time homebuyers, but there are no statistics out there. It looks like they are coming up with a program that exists for nobody, so maybe sometimes they are just guessing at what they want for money because they do not really know what they actually have, as opposed to something that might be a plan that we do not understand.

[Kelly McCauley, Conservative, Edmonton West, AB]

Mr. Speaker, Hanlon's razor says to never attribute to malice that which is more appropriately attributed to incompetence. I think both apply to the Liberal government in this case.

[Kevin Lamoureux, Liberal, Winnipeg North, MB]

Mr. Speaker, I go back to the end of last year, when the Conservative Party was doing a considerable amount of filibustering and did not even want the current bill to go to the committee stage, where maybe we would have had more discussion and more accountability with respect to asking and answering questions.

I wonder if the member has any regret or remorse that there was so much filibustering being conducted by the Conservative Party, which prevented the legislation from going to committee earlier, late last year.

[Kelly McCauley, Conservative, Edmonton West, AB]

Mr. Speaker, there is so much fiction in the member's comment that it should be a Netflix special.

The reality is that we had to drag the government, kicking and screaming, to deliver a budget. Does the member not remember when the government actually said it would not be tabling a budget until around this time of the year? The media, for once doing its job, and the opposition had to drag the government, kicking and screaming, to deliver the very documents we have now. If it were up to the Liberals, we would just be starting debate on the budget.

[Patrick Bonin, Bloc, Repentigny, QC]

Mr. Speaker, I would like to hear my colleague's comments on scrapping the Digital Services Tax Act, which made it possible to tax large digital companies with sales figures greater than $750 million. That was supposed to bring in about $1.5 billion a year for culture and regional media.

Does my colleague agree that this much-discussed digital services tax should be reinstated?

[Kelly McCauley, Conservative, Edmonton West, AB]

Mr. Speaker, the issue is not whether we should bring back the digital sales tax but whether the government should, as the Prime Minister has promised twice, strike a deal with the United States. Twice he stood publicly and said he would have a deal, the best trade deal, struck with the United States. He has not delivered that for Canadians. That is what the issue at hand is.

[Michael Cooper, Conservative, St. Albert—Sturgeon River, AB]

Mr. Speaker, I rise to speak to Bill C-15, the budget implementation act, at third reading.

The Prime Minister often bills his government as Canada's new government. It is a clear public relations effort to distance himself from 10 years of failure under Justin Trudeau. Consistent with that, the Prime Minister promised that he would take, in his words, a “very different approach” than Justin Trudeau when it comes to Canada's finances.

It is true that the Prime Minister has a very different style from Justin Trudeau, but, putting aside the facade that the Prime Minister puts on, the more that things change with the Liberals, the more they stay the same. When it comes to the policies and priorities of the Prime Minister, he is nothing more than Justin Trudeau 2.0. In some respects, he is performing worse than Justin Trudeau, as tough as that is to believe.

One area, amazingly, in which the Prime Minister is performing worse than Justin Trudeau is Canada's finances. He is a Prime Minister who promised to spend less. It turns out he is spending more, an eye-watering $90 billion more. He is a Prime Minister who has managed to double the deficit. He is presiding over a $78.3-billion deficit, up from a massive $36.3-billion deficit, which was Justin Trudeau's last massive deficit. In fact, the Prime Minister now has the record of presiding over the largest deficit in Canadian history outside COVID.

It is not as though the Prime Minister can say that this is a one-off or a one-time deal, because when one looks at the government's fiscal outlook, what we see over the next three years are deficits that are projected to average $62.3 billion, double what Justin Trudeau's government forecast.

What about fiscal anchors? Justin Trudeau's government touted its fiscal anchor, and it was quite an unambitious one, as being to keep the deficit below 1% of GDP. What has the Prime Minister done with respect to that fiscal anchor? He has blown completely past it, because the deficit-to-GDP ratio has doubled to more than 2%. The government is on course to have a deficit-to-GDP ratio double that of Justin Trudeau's fiscal anchor in the coming fiscal years.

Speaking of fiscal anchors, what is the Prime Minister's fiscal anchor? He claims he has one, which I will get into momentarily, but in substance, I would say, the Prime Minister's fiscal anchor is nothing more than smoke and mirrors in an effort to create the mirage of balancing the budget, all the while hiding massive deficits and massive debt.

The Prime Minister has created a fiscal shell game by creating two budgets: an operating budget and a capital budget. The operating budget ostensibly deals with day-to-day government spending, whereas the capital budget deals with so-called investments. One of the problems is that the government's definition of an investment is quite elastic. That is not by accident. It is quite deliberate, to give the Prime Minister and the government the flexibility to move spending from the operating budget to the capital budget and say that actually it is not spending but is investing. Again, it is smoke and mirrors.

After creating this fiscal shell game, the Prime Minister has come out and announced his big fiscal anchor, which is to balance the budget by 2028-29, but not the federal budget, the operating budget.

Here is the bottom line. Whether we look at the operating budget or the capital budget, if we call it spending or we call it investment, it all relates to the fiscal finances of Ottawa and Ottawa's bottom line. As such, when we look at the fiscal projection for fiscal year 2028-29, the year the Prime Minister is going to meet his fiscal anchor of balancing the operating budget, and we look at total revenues projected versus total spending projected, the overall deficit is projected to be a staggering $57.9 billion, which would be one of the largest deficits in Canadian history.

In short, the Prime Minister is not balancing anything. All that he is doing is making the budgeting process more complex and less transparent, all to make it more difficult to see the state of federal finances. What is the Prime Minister's spending plan between now and when he balances the operating budget? The Prime Minister is planning to rack up a quarter-trillion dollars in new debt, double the amount of debt that Justin Trudeau's government was planning to rack up during the same period of time.

The bottom line is that the Prime Minister has separated operating and capital budgets to hide from Canadians the fact that he is presiding over more spending than Justin Trudeau, and with bigger deficits, and accumulating significantly more debt. It is straight-up budget trickery by the Prime Minister.

When the Prime Minister promised that he would take a very different approach to Canada's finances than Justin Trudeau, most Canadians expected that the Prime Minister meant he would be more fiscally responsible. That is certainly what he was hoping Canadians would think. By the way, this would not be that difficult to achieve, given 10 years of fiscal vandalism under Justin Trudeau. However, the Prime Minister has not taken a very different approach. He has taken the same approach as Justin Trudeau. Just like Justin Trudeau, the Prime Minister is presiding over out-of-control spending, massive deficits and massive debt.

Here is the deal: He is a Prime Minister who is not as advertised. He calls it Canada's new government, but it is not a new government. It is the same old Liberals with the same failed and reckless fiscal policies. It is Justin Trudeau 2.0, except worse.

[Kevin Lamoureux, Liberal, Parliamentary Secretary to the Leader of the Government in the House of Commons]

Mr. Speaker, first and foremost, the member opposite has to take in the reality that there was an election and Canada does have a new Prime Minister. As much as they might want to go back, that is not the case.

Let me give a quote. This comes from the IMF's managing director. The IMF represents 190 different countries, and this is what the managing director has to say:

Both Germany and Canada recognize that in this very testing time, they need to use their fiscal space....

In the case of Canada, the Canadian authorities have been very decisive to take action in the context of changing relations with their main trading partner. And one of these actions is indeed to reform—modernize the budget framework [separating] operating expenses in the budget from investment—that ability to then focus strategically on investment that are progrowth, that can lift up productivity.

This is what the IMF is—

[The Deputy Speaker, Tom Kmiec]

I have to give the member for St. Albert—Sturgeon River a chance to respond.

[Michael Cooper, Conservative, St. Albert—Sturgeon River, AB]

Mr. Speaker, let us look at the definition of what constitutes an investment. It includes so-called incentives. It includes things that support the formation of capital or which meaningfully raise private sector productivity. In other words, the government's definition of investment includes handouts and corporate welfare. It is all part of a scheme by the Prime Minister to blur, to hide and to make it more difficult to understand the massive deficits and massive debt he is presiding over, which, as I noted, is double the deficits and double the debt of Justin Trudeau, one of the most—

[The Deputy Speaker, Tom Kmiec]

Questions and comments, the hon. member for Saint-Hyacinthe—Bagot—Acton.

[Simon-Pierre Savard-Tremblay, Bloc, Saint-Hyacinthe—Bagot—Acton, QC]

Mr. Speaker, I am wondering about something. I have a hard time understanding the Conservatives' position on Bill C‑15. They were enthused about Bill C‑5 last June; they supported not only Bill C‑5, but the different closure motions as well, including the super closure motion imposed that week. Furthermore, what kind of official opposition would support the closure motion of a government that wants to give itself free rein, proceed without consultations and circumvent existing laws? What kind of opposition is going to give a blank cheque to a government it spends all its time criticizing?

I want to understand why Bill C‑5 was acceptable when today, in their estimation, Bill C‑15 is not. Both are similar in almost every respect.

[Michael Cooper, Conservative, St. Albert—Sturgeon River, AB]

Mr. Speaker, we are standing in opposition to a budget implementation bill that is reckless, that doubles the debt of Justin Trudeau. We are not the only party that is opposing this budget implementation bill. I believe all opposition parties oppose this budget implementation bill. We are not going to support this bad legislation coming from the government.

[Kelly McCauley, Conservative, Edmonton West, AB]

Mr. Speaker, it is funny to hear the member for Winnipeg North quote—

[The Deputy Speaker, Tom Kmiec]

There is so much noise in the courtyard. It is really distracting. I am going to invite those people in the courtyard to leave the area. It is part of the downside of the courtyard. There is a lot of noise when people circulate there.

I will let the member for Edmonton West resume and complete his question or his comment.

[Kelly McCauley, Conservative, Edmonton West, AB]

Mr. Speaker, the member for Winnipeg North was quoting the IMF, which was funny because the deputy minister of finance just two weeks ago stated in the public accounts committee that anything the IMF says should be taken “with a grain of salt.” This is from his own government, but I will quote from the exact same report that states, “Directors encouraged steps to improve the transparency and accountability of public investment”. This is regarding the capital versus operating. The IMF wants transparency and accountability. It continues, “and to clarify the debt-to-GDP ratio as a formal fiscal anchor”.

I am wondering if the member can comment on the Liberals' choosing only to hand-pick and cherry-pick a few items from the IMF report and not some of the more important items.

[Michael Cooper, Conservative, St. Albert—Sturgeon River, AB]

Mr. Speaker, I guess it is politics as usual from the Liberals. That would be the explanation. I spoke about the fiscal anchor. The Liberal government had, previously, a pretty weak fiscal anchor, but it was at least a clear fiscal anchor. The Prime Minister has a convoluted, complicated fiscal anchor that is nothing more than a shell game, as I noted, to hide massive deficits and massive debt.

[Fraser Tolmie, Conservative, Moose Jaw—Lake Centre—Lanigan, SK]

Mr. Speaker, I will be splitting my time with the member for Lanark—Frontenac, who is diligently working on his speech right now.

The government will say it has a revenue problem, and it does. It will say it has a spending problem, and it does. What it will not say is that it has a priority problem. I served. I know what it means to trust that one's country has one's back. Bill C-15 is where we find out what that trust is actually worth. It is 600 pages that inflate savings that do not exist, that retroactively change the law to avoid compensating veterans who were quietly overcharged for decades, and that demand repayment from disabled veterans who can least afford it. Serving this country is not a liability to be managed, but this bill treats it like one.

I want to mention that the Standing Committee on Veterans Affairs is currently studying barriers to entrepreneurship among veterans. That study will likely conclude with a recommendation for a new grant program. That is the predictable result. However, while ACVA studies barriers, the $6.6-billion defence industrial strategy, the largest defence investment in a generation, contains zero veteran business set-asides. There is not a single line.

In the United States, veteran status opens economic doors. The GI bill's boots to business program, a 3% federal contracting carve-out for veteran-owned businesses, is a deliberate policy choice. Deliberate policy choices are important. Canada is studying barriers while actively building new ones. We do not need a new grant program. We need to treat the veterans who built this sector as qualified and important partners in its future.

The government is now claiming that Bill C-15 will generate $4.23 billion in savings by reducing cannabis reimbursement rates for veterans. Let us look at the actual numbers. VAC spends roughly $200 million a year on medical cannabis. The government is cutting the reimbursement rate by about a quarter. That is roughly $50 million in annual savings. Even over many years, the math does not come close to $4.23 billion. It would take over 30 years. The government has not explained the gap. We have asked and veterans organizations have asked repeatedly. The $4.23-billion figure relies on public sector accounting that recognizes estimated life savings all at once today. Many veterans will face higher out-of-pocket costs for products currently covered under their plan. If the government is willing to present inflated numbers when it benefits it so that it looks like it is doing what it says it is going to do, veterans and Canadians should ask what else in the bill is being measured the same way.

While this bill was being drafted, thousands of veterans were receiving letters from the government telling them to repay immediately. We are not talking about small amounts. My colleagues have documented cases exceeding $100,000 being demanded from disabled veterans. The government is clawing this money back directly from disability pensions and other payments. These are not veterans who cheated the system. My office heard from one veteran directly who has 21 years of service, a 100% disability designation and a spotless record with VAC going back a decade. When he applied for the income replacement benefit in 2015, he declared every source of income on his application, including his military pension. VAC reviewed it, accepted him into the program and sent him a letter confirming it had accounted for that pension. He kept every document.

In January of this year, the veteran received a letter from VAC telling him that he had failed to report that same pension and that he now owes over $42,000. He and his wife live on that pension income. His words to my office were that he is afraid they are going to lose their house.

He is not alone. Veterans across this country have contacted MPs to report the same pattern of repayment demands for income they had properly disclosed, with VAC's own acceptance letters sitting in their files as proof. This is not an overpayment recovery program, but an administrative failure being downloaded onto the most vulnerable people in the system. The government is demanding repayment from disabled veterans who received benefits in good faith while at the same time refusing to pay veterans who have been overcharged for 28 years. This is not fiscal policy. It is a double standard.

It never ends with the Liberal government. For nearly 30 years, Veterans Affairs Canada overcharged veterans in long-term care across the country. What was the error? When calculating care rates, VAC excluded the territories from the formula. The Interpretation Act is explicit: The definistion of province “includes Yukon, the Northwest Territories and Nunavut”. VAC ignored this, which affected the formula applied to veterans, wherever they live, by roughly $260 per month, or $3,130 per year, for nearly three decades.

A class action lawsuit was launched in October 2024 on behalf of veterans and their survivors. Bill C-15 would make that lawsuit go away.

I want to highlight that, on December 8, 2025, the Senate Standing Committee on National Security, Defence and Veterans Affairs heard testimony from VAC officials on exactly that issue. Senator Patterson asked a simple question, knowing that costs increase significantly the further north one goes, she said, “So can we not include ‘and territories’?” The VAC official answered plainly, “That would change the intent of the program.” Senator Patterson's response was, “Wow. Thank you.”

In my experience working with Senator Patterson, I have learned that she is a strong advocate for veterans and serving members. Her response says it all. She cannot believe it.

Bill C-15 makes this dire situation even worse. Sections 373 to 375 of the bill do not fix the problem, but erase it. The government is using budget implementation legislation to retroactively rewrite the law back to July 15, 1998, making that VAC deal legal in hindsight. This is not an administrative correction. Parliament is being asked to authorize the government to keep money it should never have collected from veterans in long-term care, some of whom are no longer alive to see it returned.

The Veterans ombud, retired Colonel Jardine, testified at the Standing Committee on Finance that she wrote directly to the minister on this issue calling for her to admit the mistake. She correctly points out that the bill is unprecedented, patently unfair and is calling for amendments to Bill C-15. The minister could not find the courtesy to reply to the ombud, but her department found time to write collection letters to thousands of disabled veterans.

The real issue here is that these veterans are not in their prime. They are often in long-term care. They are elderly, disabled and at their most vulnerable. They were overcharged because their government misread its own law. They had no way of knowing it. They had no way of fighting it. A class action lawsuit was their only recourse. The bill closes that door.

The question is not whether the government can find the money, but whether the people who wore the uniform deserve to be treated fairly for the country they served. This bill answers that question, and the answer is no. This is a shameful use of Parliament's powers.

When one serves, they learn that the person beside them will not leave them behind. That is not a policy, but a promise. Veterans deserve better. I will not be supporting this.

[Ginette Petitpas Taylor, Liberal, Moncton—Dieppe, NB]

Mr. Speaker, I would like to take a moment to thank my colleague for his service to our country. I would also to thank his family, because when a member serves, their family serves with them.

My colleague talked a bit during his speech about deliberate policy choices. I am wondering if he could elaborate on why the Conservative government, in 2014, closed nine Veterans Affairs offices, slashed the jobs of Veterans Affairs staff who provided direct services to veterans and cut the benefits budget.

I am just wondering if the member could elaborate on the deliberate policy choice that was made at that time.

[Fraser Tolmie, Conservative, Moose Jaw—Lake Centre—Lanigan, SK]

Mr. Speaker, I would like to point out, and let us state the facts, that many of the offices were streamlined into Service Canada offices and were not closed, as my colleague has said. We are putting veterans here.

The questions I am getting from veterans are not from 2014; they are from now. The questions I am getting are from now, and the Liberal government is in power. It has had 10 years, almost 11 years, to fix the problem, and it has done nothing. It has ignored the problem, and now it is trying to hide it.

[Patrick Bonin, Bloc, Repentigny, QC]

Mr. Speaker, I would like to know whether my colleague agrees with the carbon capture and sequestration tax credit increase and extension for oil and gas companies. Our Conservative colleagues often object to spending public funds this way or handing out subsidies.

However, do they consider this direct subsidy to oil companies, owned in large part by Americans already making billions in profits, to be acceptable?

[Fraser Tolmie, Conservative, Moose Jaw—Lake Centre—Lanigan, SK]

Mr. Speaker, the carbon tax is a hot button for me because I have seen the carbon tax being downloaded to provinces in hospitals when we were having a health care crisis. I have seen it downloaded to provinces when we have had an education crisis, where school boards are struggling to make ends meet. I have also seen it downloaded to municipalities when kids are going to learn how to swim, where the recreation fees are going up and parents are drowning in taxes. This is what I have seen from the Liberal government. Money is not getting to the people it needs to get to, and that is just wrong.