Debates of April 30th, 2026

Opposition Motion—Sovereign Wealth Fund

[An hon. member]

Oh, oh!

[Anthony Housefather, Liberal, Mount Royal, QC]

I also thank the member for Lakeland for having the best laugh in the House.

Mr. Speaker, it is funny that there are so many statistics related to Canada's performance within the G7 that are so favourable to Canada, and yet some in the opposition basically say, “Well, it doesn't matter. We're only comparing ourselves to ourselves, so what does it matter what the debt ratio is in France or in England?” Then with other statistics that they say are negative, they spout the same G7 statistics.

Does the member find that to be a contradiction?

[Kevin Lamoureux, Liberal, Winnipeg North, MB]

Mr. Speaker, many years ago, I took a course dealing with stats and how stats could ultimately be twisted and so forth. The bottom line is, I believe if we do a relative comparison between Canada and the G20 countries or the G7 countries, more often than not, we will find Canada in the top three and often the top two in terms of overall performance. I am very comfortable with where we are compared to other nations, in particular within the G20.

[Warren Steinley, Conservative, Regina—Lewvan, SK]

Mr. Speaker, this sovereign debt fund is nothing new. The Liberal government has had funds like this before. One is the Canada Infrastructure Bank. The Canada Infrastructure Bank is supposed to disburse its $35‑billion capital envelope by 2027-28, but on July 10, the PBO reported it had disbursed only $14.9 billion and it was $21 billion short of its target. These Liberals fail every time they try to attract investment. There is nothing but failure that has followed this Prime Minister everywhere he has gone, whether it be the Bank of England or the Bank of Canada. He has printed money and caused inflation everywhere. People from Saskatchewan have seen this movie before where the government thinks it can invest their money better than they can, and it has ended in a complete failure and out-migration. I am scared to see the same thing happen to Canada, which I love.

How can people trust this unethical, corrupt government to actually invest money properly?

[Kevin Lamoureux, Liberal, Winnipeg North, MB]

Mr. Speaker, the member is trying to sell the Canadian public literally false information to try to give the impression that Canada is broken and that everything is an absolute failure. No one believes him. At the end of the day, I would ultimately argue, as I have in the past, that Canada is, and will continue to be, the best country—

[The Assistant Deputy Speaker, John Nater]

Order. There is a point of order from the member for Regina—Lewvan.

[Warren Steinley, Conservative, Regina—Lewvan, SK]

Mr. Speaker, the member said I made a false statement. I would like him to clarify what statement was false.

[The Assistant Deputy Speaker, John Nater]

Again, that is not a point of order. We are in questions and comments. I am not going to give the chance to respond because there is no point of order.

Questions and comments, the hon. member for Lac-Saint-Jean.

[Alexis Brunelle-Duceppe, Bloc, Lac-Saint-Jean, QC]

Mr. Speaker, Canada's new sovereign wealth fund is neither sovereign nor independent, and yet my colleague continues to compare it to Norway's sovereign wealth fund. The only thing these two funds have in common—because they do indeed have one thing in common—is the name.

My question is very specific, and I would like my colleague to answer it. If the government buys a cat and tells everyone it is a horse, does he think people will call it a horse or a cat?

[Kevin Lamoureux, Liberal, Winnipeg North, MB]

Mr. Speaker, I think Canadians as a whole are very smart. They understand that there are dozens of other countries around the world that have some form of sovereign wealth fund. The Canada Strong fund that is being created as a national sovereign wealth fund here in Canada is a positive thing. I can understand the Bloc does not want to see it. I am disappointed that the Conservatives are opposing it, but at the end of the day, this fund will generate significant investments. It will provide thousands of jobs, I would ultimately argue, into the future. It will provide an economic boost. It will provide improvements in the overall GDP. I believe we should be supporting it.

[Melissa Lantsman, Conservative, Thornhill, ON]

Mr. Speaker, there is an old joke about a man who racks up an enormous credit card debt, takes a second mortgage, opens a savings account and tells his wife it did not cost them anything. That joke is a pretty accurate description of the government's economic policy, and we are all the wife.

The Prime Minister has announced a $25-billion so-called sovereign wealth fund, and Canadians deserve a serious accounting of what has actually been put in front of them. Let us begin with the most fundamental question: What precisely is a sovereign wealth fund? A real one would be built on genuine surpluses. We heard in the House today about Norway. Norway's government pension fund, the model the Prime Minister so eagerly name-drops, was capitalized by petroleum revenues. It has $1 trillion of assets because Norway saved when times were good.

Canada is not Norway. Norway has oil money and Canada has vibes and a $25-billion credit card statement. We are running an almost $70-billion deficit in the current fiscal year alone, double the last guy's, so we do not have surpluses to invest. We have deficits to finance, and $25-billion seed money in this fund is not savings. It is actually borrowed money any way we look at it. It is debt finance, like every other federal expenditure that exceeds our revenues. The Prime Minister is not building a wealth fund. He is building a debt fund, and he should be honest with Canadians about it.

Let us be clear about what it means for every Canadian household. The government is borrowing at roughly 3.5% or 4% on 10-year bonds and betting that a bureaucratic Crown corporation run by political appointees will outperform the cost of that capital. It is leveraged speculation with taxpayer collateral, and not the nation building that the Prime Minister is suggesting it is.

I have heard Liberal government members say that this fund will be different, that it will be more transparent, more accountable and better governed. I would feel more confident about that claim if they could tell us who is going to govern it, how the projects would be selected, when it would be operational and what relationship any of this would have to the Canada Infrastructure Bank or the Canada Growth Fund. They cannot answer any of those questions today, and we will see that throughout the day. I am certainly not alone in asking them.

This announcement landed with a giant thud. The sovereign wealth fund proposal was met with near-universal skepticism, disbelief and, frankly, pure ridicule. The Globe and Mail, not exactly a Conservative voice in Canada, observed this week that the pension funds that presumably partner with this vehicle, including the Canada Pension Plan Investment Board, were not even consulted before this announcement was made.

The CPP Investment Board, to its credit, said that the key to long-term success for any public investment institution is “a clear commercial mandate, strong governance, and operational independence.” That is a politely worded way of saying that it has concerns. We should have concerns, because the question cuts to the heart of this whole exercise. The fund's mandate is politically directed toward domestic infrastructure such as ports, mines and trade corridors, with diversification explicitly not a priority. It is then not truly an investment fund at all.

In the Globe's words, it is an “off-balance sheet vehicle for fiscal policy.” That is a government wealth fund in a costume. It is actually just another government program. We have seen this movie before and we know how it ends. Sustainable Development Technology Canada, which members might remember now as the green slush fund, sent $400 million out to Liberal-backed pet projects with 186 identified conflicts of interest, zero accountability and zero measurable results.

The Canada Infrastructure Bank was also endowed with $45 billion in infrastructure. It spent a fraction of that on actual construction while handing out $8 million in bonuses since 2024. The Prime Minister himself made these comparisons earlier this week. With respect, I do not think it is the endorsement he thinks it is.

Here is a deeper problem. The reason that major projects are not getting built in Canada is not a lack of government capital, and that is the point here. There is not a lack of capital in Canada. They can ask anybody. If an infrastructure project is not moving forward, it is almost certainly because the private sector stakeholders have determined that it is not economically viable or because of the absurd regulatory environment. They have told us this. One does not solve an onerous regulatory environment by creating a new Crown corporation to fund projects the private sector stakeholders already said no to. One solves it by fixing the actual regulatory environment. Even industry leaders are telling the Financial Times, not a Conservative blog but the Financial Times of London, saying that the government's red-tape cutting efforts are already floundering, costing more in lost trade than Trump's tariffs ever did. Forestry executives are frustrated. People in the oil and gas sector are frustrated. Auto executives are frustrated. What do we do? We create another bypass around the dysfunction, instead of fixing the dysfunction itself.

The Liberals have created an $18-billion-a-year regulatory burden. They have interprovincial trade barriers in place that knock $200 billion off our GDP. They are married to Bill C-69, the tanker ban, the policy uncertainty that has chased a trillion dollars out of this economy over the 10 years. Capital did not flee Canada because there was no government bank to subsidize it. It fled because it was simply unprofitable to do business here. A $25-billion Band-Aid applied over a gaping wound does not close the wound. It just becomes a really expensive Band-Aid that Canadians will end up paying for.

There are real alternatives to this. We could genuinely cut taxes so that families have more in their pockets every single month and business owners have a reason to stay here or to open up their business here in the first place. We can eliminate red tape and trade barriers that cost hundreds of billions of dollars in lost economic activity every year. I just do not understand how that is never the solution that they go to. We could fast-track approvals and start building things rather than funding another Ottawa office to study the feasibility of someday perhaps getting something built. We could scrap the bad laws, including Bill C-69, the tanker ban and the industrial carbon tax. They are actively preventing pipelines, mines and LNG terminals from being constructed. That is not this side of the House saying that. That is the industry representatives themselves. None of this would require borrowing $25 billion of new money. All of it would create much more wealth than the government ever could.

That is how to build a country, not on borrowed money funnelled through a Crown corporation whose governance, mandate and accountability mechanisms have yet to be designed but were announced first and with details to follow. Canadians get to pay the bill.

This House is owed answers that the government has not provided. Who runs the fund? How much in terms of management fees did they get? On what criteria are projects approved? What prevents them from being another vehicle for the same Liberal patronage networks that have embarrassed the government repeatedly? We will keep asking those questions. We will keep being the voice of every single Canadian who can see clearly what this is.

When this was announced, I could not find a whole lot of people who were excited about it, except for the members on the other side of the House. They keep telling Canadians that Canadians do not understand the potential of this and this is based on hope, but everything this would do is the opposite of what the government says it is going to do. It is going to spend borrowed money, pick winners and losers, mostly losers, in our own economy and distort the market.

Canada's federal deficit sits at 2.1% of GDP. It is higher than it was last year. That is not lower. That is going in the wrong direction. Interest on the debt is heading past $80 billion annually, double what it was just four years ago.

I will close with a sincere request for the government. Put down the $25-billion chequebook, step away from the podium at the Canada Science and Technology Museum and try something truly novel the government could not do in over a decade. Get out of the way, so that private capital and private business could be put to work here once and for all.

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

Mr. Speaker, I have had the opportunity to ask a couple of questions already today. There is a theme coming out of the Conservative Party. I recognize that and it is a very simple one, which is just to get out of the way. It is something that the Conservatives have said, not only in regard to this policy but in regard to a litany of virtually all policies that the Conservative Party seems to want to favour.

Do members of today's new Conservative Party believe there are circumstances and actions that the government can take that would support the economy, that would involve things such as sovereign wealth funds or an infrastructure bank? Does she have any—

[The Assistant Deputy Speaker, John Nater]

The hon. member for Thornhill.

[Melissa Lantsman, Conservative, Thornhill, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I know that we are discussing the sovereign wealth fund today, but this is not what the government is proposing. In fact, the Liberals cannot even talk about it in their questions. The sovereign wealth fund, or the sovereign debt fund, that they are proposing is the exact opposite of one that would actually work. It would work in an economy where we have surpluses and resource revenue, and it would invest outside the country and not distort the market within the country by picking the very projects that make it unprofitable in the first place for businesses to invest.

This is the problem with the Liberals' government. Every single time, their solution is to come in and distort the market, regulate the market and subsidize the market so nobody can build here. That is evidenced by the $1 trillion of capital that has fled this country.

[Xavier Barsalou-Duval, Bloc, Pierre-Boucher—Les Patriotes—Verchères, QC]

Mr. Speaker, I congratulate my colleague on her speech. At times, we do agree with the Conservatives. When that happens, perhaps the government should listen.

The government, as part of its Canada Strong fund—which it likes to describe as a sovereign wealth fund—has determined that project selection would be carried out by the Major Projects Office and that these projects would first be chosen by the Prime Minister's Office.

Does my colleague find it reassuring that a supposedly independent fund will ultimately have to select its investments from the Prime Minister's choices?

[Melissa Lantsman, Conservative, Thornhill, ON]

Mr. Speaker, it is always an interesting day here when we agree with the Bloc Québécois.

This government has now put forward a 13th new bureaucracy. All of these bureaucracies have one thing in common: They are there to distort the market. Private companies chose not to invest in something, so the government comes and backfills that capital, which already exists in this country, by choosing the projects that go forward. That is the opposite of how a free market works. It is the opposite of how this country was built throughout generations. I cannot understand why the Liberal government always chooses the wrong path when it comes to building Canada's future.

[Scott Anderson, Conservative, Vernon—Lake Country—Monashee, BC]

Mr. Speaker, with regard to Norway's sovereign wealth fund, I decided to do the same thing as the Prime Minister, because he is a wise person. I decided that what I would do is take the bulk of the money out of my credit card, put it in my savings account and call it “Scott's retirement fund”. Then I went to my accountant, who said that I would never retire. I was wondering if the member could explain to me why that is.

[Melissa Lantsman, Conservative, Thornhill, ON]

Mr. Speaker, that is what some people call “girl math”. I call it “Liberal math.”

I have been guilty of doing the same thing. I see a very expensive thing that I absolutely cannot afford, and I buy it on sale when it is 5% off. I convince myself that I got all these savings for it. That is Liberal math. That is how the math works in this place.

Canadians do not need a wealth fund. They need a government that is going to handle affordability in a responsible way and stop leveraging the national credit card so Canadians have to leverage theirs for groceries.

[Shannon Stubbs, Conservative, Lakeland, AB]

Mr. Speaker, like many Canadians, I remember a time when hard work paid off in Canada, when people could start a business or a family with hope for a bright and prosperous future, and when government did not stand in the way of businesses, pick winners and losers in industry and society, or tax Canadians, businesses and entrepreneurs at every turn. That was just over a decade ago, under the last Conservative government, led by Stephen Harper. Canada had a balanced budget and a $1‑billion surplus. Canada had the strongest economy in the G7, with the largest and most prosperous middle class in the world. That is the Canada the Liberals inherited. Since then, they have imposed punitive laws that landlock and roadblock Canadians, entrepreneurs, investors and inventors with costly red tape, mixed messages and constantly shifting policies and regulations.

Today, the Prime Minister sits in the same chair he advised for the last half-decade, where he pushed policies that strangled the Canadian economy and drove $1 trillion of investment out of Canada and into the United States, which probably explains why he moved Brookfield south of the border. The results speak for themselves. After 11 years of this same Liberal government and a year of this Prime Minister with all the same key players, Canada now has the highest household debt, the most unaffordable housing, the lowest investment per worker, the second-worst productivity and the second-highest unemployment in the G7. The Prime Minister cannot blame global factors. Other countries face the same pressures and have responded with real action and secure trade deals, while the Liberals have responded with delay and confusion. Canadians are in this position because Liberal policies punish work and drive out investment for anti-development ideology and government control.

How do the Liberals respond? Well, they set up another half-baked scheme. This week, the Prime Minister announced a so-called sovereign wealth fund or, as he calls it, “a people's fund”. I wonder if that name came from his visit to Beijing. In this long, drawn-out, rhetorical photo op, he said that this fund would finance major projects in Canada, because nothing says free enterprise like a government fund that looks like top-down state control, does it?

However, he did point out Norway and Singapore as examples. Let us look at his claims and how they compare to his plan for Canada. Norway, of course, is a unitary state, with a single centralized government. It runs consistent budget surpluses, because it develops its abundant resources, especially oil and gas, which drives its economy, creates jobs and funds strong public services without crushing taxpayers. In fact, Norway's budget surplus is one of the largest in the world and far exceeds the OECD average. The Norwegian government then puts that extra wealth into their sovereign wealth fund.

Singapore, which the Prime Minister also mentioned, is a small city-state that built a highly attractive business environment with low taxes and minimal red tape that draws investment, jobs and businesses. Singapore has low corporate tax rates, big tax exemptions, no capital gains tax, and a highly efficient, transparent and independent legal system for permitting and contract enforcement. It competes for investment; it does not chase it away. Oh, and it has a big budget surplus, too. The Singaporean government puts that wealth into their sovereign wealth fund.

Now, let us look at Canada. The Prime Minister said that he would saddle Canada with a budget deficit of $66.9 billion, which is double Trudeau's. If it requires further clarity, that is the opposite of a surplus. The Prime Minister also revealed that debt interest charges alone will be $59 billion annually, and that will rise by 50%, up to $80 billion, in 2030. Of course, it does not stop there. The Liberals' $264‑million Major Projects Office has approved zero projects. There is no start date, deadline, start point, end point or really any clear material progress on the Prime Minister's promised pipeline to the Pacific, and Liberal red tape still drives business out of Canada.

Just this week, business leaders said that Liberal anti-development laws are worse for Canada than Trump's tariffs. François Poirier, CEO of TC Energy, said, “Capital goes where it is welcome. And for too long, it hasn’t felt welcome here”. David Pierce, from the Canadian Chamber of Commerce, said, “I've heard of resource projects that require hundreds of permits, due to federal, provincial and municipal requirements”. He tells the truth. Enbridge, North America's top pipeline company, said, “changes in policy and regulatory environment need to happen”, not only for a new pipeline but “for producers to have confidence to increase production”. Not really an attractive business climate, is it?

Under these Liberals, Canada does not have a budget surplus; caused a historic capital flight, especially to the U.S., which started in 2015 and has gotten worse every year since; and does not develop or export the full potential of Canada's resources, either for Canadians here at home or for allies abroad. In fact, this government blocks projects, landlocks production, bans exports and then wonders why investment leaves.

There really was no point at all to compare Canada's alleged sovereign wealth fund, which is clearly a sovereign debt fund, to Norway or to Singapore, other than to make it seem like the Liberals have a good plan, but it is just an illusion.

What wealth is actually going into this so-called wealth fund? It seems like the Prime Minister had an idea. One could say it is the Liberals' old reliable. They will, of course, take Canadians' money, just like they always do, because, when in doubt, they will just tax Canadians out: out of their homes, out of their businesses and, in the very end, all the way out of Canada. He said that if Canadians had a bit of extra money, they could give it to him, just a few bucks here or there, because he needs more of their money. He thinks he has not taken enough of it.

For the Liberals, it is always “spend first, tax everyone and everything later”. Why does he want our money? What is the point of this sovereign debt fund in the first place? It seems to be so the Prime Minister will have the power to bankroll hand-picked projects while claiming it is independent. He will be able to pick winners of a few and make losers of the rest in Canada's economy. He will make sure, once and for all, that the lucky few who tow Liberal talking points and parrot his globalist, European, neo-Marxist agenda get to rake it in, so they can hire the top consultants, line their pockets and add just a few more zeros to their big fat bonuses.

As for the rest, they get shut out and drowned in anti-development laws, regulations and taxes. They get told to go wait at the back of the line, while the Prime Minister holds the door open for his big banker elite buddies, his cronies, all the guys who helped get him to where he is today. As Dan Kelly, president of the Canadian Federation of Independent Business, said, “every other unwashed business owner [is] stuck in the old, unworkable system.” Meanwhile, food banks get 2.2 million visits per month, double from seven years ago. Canadians are forced to sacrifice basics and put food back on the shelves. More young Canadians lose hope as to whether they will ever be able to get a home, start a family or get ahead, no matter how hard they work.

Another bureaucracy is not the solution to $1 trillion in lost investment. Another bureaucracy is not the solution to lost opportunities across Canada after a decade of the Liberals, but to them it appears to be. They have created the Canada Infrastructure Bank, the Growth Fund, the Major Projects Office, the defence bank and the green slush fund, but Canada still has the worst investment record in the G7. Those have not worked so far. Why do the Liberals expect that another one will? We know the definition of insanity. This is more bureaucracy, another fund with no delivered results for Canadians, but words that sound good. What they have delivered are more offices funded by taxpayers and more executives who get six-figure salaries while everyone else suffers.

Instead of pouring more money into a broken system, the Liberals should fix their own laws and regulations that broke it in the first place, but why would they? As long as the Liberals are in total control, with their laws, policies, taxes and red tape, they can extort private businesses and provinces to get their way and to implement their agenda so the Prime Minister can make sure that his agenda to creep more into Canadians' lives, into provincial, territorial and municipal jurisdiction, and into Canada's private sector will be put into place. It sounds like a certain Communist regime to me. After all, he seems much more comfortable now cozying up to Beijing, as he lets their EVs on Canadian streets, even though they spy on Canadians and interfere in Canadian elections, academia, social media, law enforcement, defence and natural resources.

The whole point of a private sector, of a free economy, is supposed to be freedom from government interference, the freedom for businesses to prosper and to create jobs without being taxed to high heavens, since lower taxes actually always result in more government revenue, so that Canadians can build good lives without the need to survive on government programs. That is necessary, also, to ensure that supports for vulnerable Canadians who really need a safety net can be sustainable.

That is why Conservatives will fight every day for affordable and abundant Canadian energy and exports, low inflation and low taxes by cutting the cost of government, free market competition, and a self-reliant, sovereign and secure Canada.

Life does not have to be this way. In a country as rich in natural and human resources as Canada, no business should be driven out and no family should have to choose between heating their home and feeding their kids. The beauty of Canada, its resilience, is the diversity of regions, resources and people who work, live and co-operate free of government micromanagement, who build a nation on hard work and share in opportunity and prosperity to pass on something stronger and better to the next generation, not controlled by Ottawa, not held back by red tape, but driven by hard work, innovation and pride in what Canadians can build ourselves and in who we are. That is what Conservatives will fight for every day.

[Arielle Kayabaga, Liberal, London West, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I have been listening to the Conservatives' position on anything that supports Canadians moving forward and Canadians having opportunities to grow our wealth and to grow our economy. Unless it is their idea, they are against it. Listening to them talk, it is almost like they are against Canada. They are talking about unlocking opportunities for Canadians, yet they constantly vote against Canadians.

Can my hon. colleague tell me why they continue to vote against Canada?

[Shannon Stubbs, Conservative, Lakeland, AB]

Mr. Speaker, let me give the member some advice right off the top. I think she should actually engage in the policy discussion here instead of impugning the motives of duly and equally elected people who represent hundreds of thousands of Canadians and care about our country exactly as much as, and maybe more than, every single other person, which is why we are fighting so hard to save it.

I think that as a Liberal government member, she should stand up here and explain all the details about the fund: exactly how it would work, who would run it and what it would do for Canadians who cannot afford to pay rent or their mortgage, or to feed themselves, people who have to ration their basics and live in sacrifice because that is what the government has made them do. It is the member's job to stand up to answer those questions.

[Dan Muys, Conservative, Flamborough—Glanbrook—Brant North, ON]

Mr. Speaker, my colleague from Lakeland is exactly right. Eleven years ago, we had the richest, most prosperous middle class in the world here in Canada, but we have moved a long way from that. Canada has the lowest private sector investment in our economy of all the OECD countries because of the regulatory and tax burden that is choking and chasing away investment.

I would like the member to comment on the fact that it has been nine months since the Major Projects Office was approved in legislation, and zero shovels are in the ground, yet Germany built an LNG intake facility in 6.5 months, the Netherlands in six months and Finland in four months.

[Shannon Stubbs, Conservative, Lakeland, AB]

Mr. Speaker, I thank the member for all his advocacy for energy development and for making life more affordable for every single Canadian in every part of the country.

Of course he is exactly right. The Major Projects Office is just the latest example of big promises and great rhetoric of the government's trying to pretend it is new compared to the exact same one that it was, which had driven out investment. In fact, the member raises a major point. In 2015, and I wonder what happened then, it the first time in Canadian history that capital from Canada started to flow into the U.S., rather than the other way around, and it has gotten worse every year since.

Here we are, a year out, and the Major Projects Office has not designated a single project in the national interest. Most of the projects it is announcing have already been built, and most have already gone through regulators or their provincial jurisdiction. There are a bunch of others for which nobody has any idea what is going to happen. There are a hundred people who are making a lot of money, and the Liberals have not delivered on a single thing in terms of their promises for getting major projects built or for cutting red tape and interprovincial trade barriers. That is the problem. They—

[The Assistant Deputy Speaker, John Nater]

The hon. member for Pierre‑Boucher—Les Patriotes—Verchères.

[Xavier Barsalou-Duval, Bloc, Pierre-Boucher—Les Patriotes—Verchères, QC]

Mr. Speaker, I must say that I was rather impressed by the intensity of my colleague's speech. It was very substantial. There was so much to it that I could not take it all in.

I would like to hear more about the merits of creating a so-called sovereign wealth fund to fund major projects, when apparently the Canada Infrastructure Bank is already being used for that purpose.

Why launch a new fund when we already have a tool that does the same thing?