Garnett Genuis

[Human Rights, February 3rd, 2017]

Mr. Speaker, I do appreciate the words from the parliamentary secretary, but I looked at the Facebook page for the Canadian embassy in Burma. It talks about Canadian winters, it talks about the new year, and it talks about a golf tournament, but it makes no mention of the systematic killing of minorities.

The Liberals said, when they cancelled the Office of Religious Freedom, that all embassies would be promoting human rights, but that does not appear to be happening in this case.

Will the Liberals commit today to step up and do more, and ensure our embassies do more, to speak out and to help the people in Burma being murdered and raped because of their backgrounds?

[Human Rights, February 3rd, 2017]

Mr. Speaker, reports of the ethnic cleansing of Muslim Rohingya people in Burma may not get the same headlines as events in the U.S., but the terrible killings and other crimes in that country do require our urgent attention.

Burma is a major recipient of Canadian foreign aid, yet the Liberals have barely commented. What does the minister have to say about this dire situation, and what has the Liberal government done about it?

[Business of Supply, February 2nd, 2017]

Mr. Speaker, I would like to again ask my colleague to reflect on what the government is doing in terms of the impact the tax changes are having on those who are of relatively modest means. It has not lowered taxes for those making less than $45,000 a year. In fact, it has raised them through the carbon tax and the lowering of the amount an individual can contribute to a tax-free savings account. People in my riding are very concerned about the impact of higher carbon taxes which they have to pay as a result of the actions of provincial and federal governments.

I wonder if the member can reflect on the impact on those of modest means and how we can help those who need the help the most by lowering their taxes.

[Business of Supply, February 2nd, 2017]

Mr. Speaker, the member spoke about broken promises. I just read a piece in the Huffington Post by the member for Beaches—East York, who recognizes and apologizes for the government breaking its promise on the issue of electoral reform.

Returning to the topic of the so-called middle-class tax cut, we and the NDP have said that people making $45,000 or less definitely belong in the category of either, depending on their income, the middle class or those working hard to join it, yet they do not benefit from the government's tax proposals, and they will suffer under all the changes being contemplated with respect to tax expenditures.

Would the member agree with me on that? Would he also comment on the Liberals' review of tax expenditures, which are actually going to, in perhaps a less direct or public way but in a very real and impactful way, raise the taxes of Canadians?

[Business of Supply, February 2nd, 2017]

Mr. Speaker, if that member thinks talking about the government's plan to raise taxes is a waste of time, then he can defend that position to his constituents. I can say that what my constituents want us to talk about is exactly the government's plan to raise taxes, and we will take every opportunity to draw attention to it.

[Business of Supply, February 2nd, 2017]

Mr. Speaker, this is an interesting criterion the NDP applies to decision-making: If it does not cause the apocalypse, then it is okay. My position on carbon taxes is that they will not cause the apocalypse but that they are still bad.

We have a carbon tax in Alberta, a carbon tax that the current provincial government did not discuss during the election. It may be that many jurisdictions across the country have carbon taxes. I suspect that we will not have one in Alberta in three years, but who is counting?

[Business of Supply, February 2nd, 2017]

Mr. Speaker, there is maybe too much there to address all of it at once.

The member notes the recession that Canada went through in 2008-09, as if he is under the impression that that was the result of Canadian policy. I have never heard anyone suggest that before. Maybe this member knows something that I do not.

He said that the Conservatives left a deficit for the Liberals. Well, the department of finance disagrees, the parliamentary budget officer disagrees, and even the NDP disagree with that. The only people who think the Liberals received a deficit are the Liberals. Let me say, they tried hard to spend as much as they could when they took office to obscure the record, but, again, the parliamentary budget office and the department of finance have been very clear on this point.

With respect to the question on tax-free savings accounts, the member thinks that only 7% of Canadians have TFSAs available to them. I invite him to visit fin.gc.ca, which explains how tax-free savings accounts are available to anybody who wants to put money aside, tax-free. That is the reality.

[Business of Supply, February 2nd, 2017]

Mr. Speaker, it is a pleasure for me to rise and address this important motion, and more broadly the issues around it in terms of the government's tax policy.

We are having this discussion at an interesting moment in light of what the government is doing. I am a relatively young member. I am the youngest member of the Conservative caucus. I know many young people actually voted for the government with high expectations based on promises made and based on the Prime Minister's effort to strike an optimistic tone, yet we are seeing through the actions of the government on the economic front and other fronts the real cynicism of the Prime Minister and the government in the shameless way in which they are throwing promises over the side. They are throwing out their commitments. They are defending that as if it were not a problem, not a big deal at all.

The Prime Minister said in question period yesterday that he was going to do what he perceived to be in the national interest, not just act to tick a box on a platform. That shows quite a bit of disdain and disregard not only for the platform the Liberal Party ran on, but also for the Canadians who voted based on what was in that platform. We see the cynicism with which the Prime Minister has thrown the electoral reform question over the side, and the cynicism of the government's budgetary policy commitments. It made clear commitments to run $10 billion deficits for three years and then to return to a balanced budget, and yet there are massive deficits that far and away exceed those commitments, with no plan to balance the budget for decades into the future. That is real cynicism coming from the government, and it is hard to take.

The government also promised cuts to taxes for the middle class, and yet people making less than $45,000 a year, certainly the middle class and those working hard to join it, are suffering because of new taxes imposed by the government.

The Liberals' platform promised to lower the small business tax rate to 9%. The first budget said, “Well, we do not need to do that. It is not in the national interest and we are not going to be bound to checking boxes on the platform.” The impact of effectively raising taxes on small business does not just have an impact on business owners, but it also has an impact on people who work for small businesses. Most Canadians work for small businesses. It has an impact on Canadians who are unemployed, who might otherwise have the opportunity to get jobs working for small businesses.

The government also did away with the small business hiring credit. It passed legislation to raise payroll taxes. In so many ways, we see the government introducing the worst possible kinds of taxes: taxes on jobs, taxes on people of modest means who are working, who now will have a harder time retaining their job or finding a new job because of these taxes.

The government lowered the amount a person can invest in a tax-free savings account. The data show that those who use tax-free savings accounts are more likely to be of relatively modest means, likely because of the relative advantage of saving in a TFSA versus an RRSP for those who are of relatively modest means.

We have all these different areas in which the cynicism of the government is on display. We see how much disdain the Liberals have for their own platform and for Canadians who voted based on that platform.

It is ironic, because we hear often from the Prime Minister in particular about getting young people involved in politics. When we see these cynical actions of the government, it really can be discouraging to young people who may have volunteered, or who voted thinking they were getting one thing from the government and in fact what they are getting is the opposite. They are getting effective tax increases for those in the middle class and those of relatively modest means. They are also getting a complete denial of commitments the Liberals made with respect to electoral reform and other areas.

What we are talking about in this opposition motion is the fact that we have seen all of these efforts of the government to indirectly, but, at the same time, in a very concrete, practical, and impactful way, increase the taxes that people pay. Thank goodness we have a very effective opposition here, because up until yesterday, the government was musing about the possibility of introducing a significant tax on health and dental benefits.

Canadians may not know all of the procedural mechanics of this place. When the opposition proposes an opposition day motion, it puts that on notice a couple of days before. Today is Thursday. On Tuesday, Conservatives put notice of a motion forward that on Thursday there would be a debate about the government's plan to increase taxes on health and dental benefits. Then, all of a sudden, on Wednesday, the Prime Minister announces in question period that the government is not moving forward on that. If we had more opposition days, think of how well we would be doing, but, alas, we only have so many days allotted.

While we are having this discussion, let us recognize the reality of the timing of what the government did. I wish that was all it took to make this a great budget. We have improved the budget a little, but I suspect that there will still be issues in the budget that Conservatives take issue with. Perhaps the government will take their advice again and actually check that box in the Liberal platform by following through on the tax reduction for small businesses. Maybe it will restore the hiring credit to help people in my province, especially those struggling with high levels of unemployment, and across the country get back to work.

Let us hope that maybe it will reverse course on some of these major tax increases it has brought in. Maybe it will reverse course even on the carbon tax, a punitive tax against those who would like to heat their homes, a punitive tax against the mother in my riding who actually cannot walk to the grocery store because she has two little kids. These are the people who are suffering because of the carbon tax that has now been imposed in Alberta and that the government wants to force a subsequent provincial government, which some people are looking forward to, not to do away with. That is a real problem on all of these different fronts: the government looking to impose new taxes to raise taxes.

I want to draw the attention of members as well to the fact that over the summer the Minister of Finance asked people to do a review of what are often called tax expenditures. Effectively, these are the mechanisms in the tax code that allow people to reduce their taxes by claiming different deductions. Experts have proposed all kinds of so-called tax expenditures to eliminate. We need to know what the government is actually planning to do, because I know a lot of people are concerned about it. They are concerned that there may be changes with respect to tax credits on charitable donations.

The Conservative government brought in a volunteer firefighter tax credit to encourage people to be involved in their communities and do what they can to be part of fighting fires in their communities. One of the recommendations from the experts has been to get rid of that. There is the public transit tax credit. Here is an idea. When we are trying to improve the environment, instead of levying a tax on people to improve the environment, let us cut their taxes in order to improve the environment. That was the approach that Conservatives took, to have a green tax cut instead of a so-called new green tax. In fact, when the current government thinks green, all it is thinking about are ways of taking more money from Canadians.

There was a proposal with respect to pension income splitting from one of the experts. I hope the government does not go down the road of eliminating pension income splitting. Of course, Liberals said during the election campaign that they would not, but maybe 2015 was the last election in which the Liberals said they would not get rid of income splitting for pensioners. Maybe that is what we will be hearing later on, because checking boxes on their platform just does not seem to matter to the Prime Minister or the government anymore.

Canadians are suffering because of tax increases, and they are suffering because of the shameless cynicism of this Prime Minister. Thank goodness the opposition was able to make a difference on this health and dental plan issue. Hopefully the government will start to listen to us on other measures as well.

[Business of Supply, February 2nd, 2017]

Madam Speaker, while the member talks about the middle class, I think the reality is that the government is only interested in the Prime Minister's vacation entourage and those working hard to join it.

I will ask about the tax-free savings account issue that the member raised. I think she knows, and the data are there on the Finance Canada website as to who are most likely to use tax-free savings accounts. We know actually that half of those who are maxing out their tax-free savings accounts are people with relatively modest incomes. We know that is because of the relative economic advantages that accrue to a tax-free savings account versus an RRSP.

When the Liberals talk about helping those in the middle and on the low end, why do they not actually do something for those making $45,000 or less, whom they have done nothing for? Why do the Liberals not reinstate the tax-free savings account limits that were in place under the previous government?

[Employment in Alberta, February 1st, 2017]

Mr. Speaker, it was great to be able to spend time in my riding over the constituency break. I hosted four round table meetings and a Christmas open house. I visited businesses and met with constituents one on one.

The number one concern of my constituents remains the economy. Alberta is facing very high unemployment. We have lost jobs in the energy sector but also in other sectors.

It was an honour to welcome my friend, the MP for Edmonton Riverbend, to my riding for a joint round table on how to create jobs in Alberta. He and the member for Calgary Nose Hill are chairing the Alberta jobs task force, a Conservative initiative to generate constructive ideas to help the government respond. This was our best attended round table yet.

January saw the introduction of a provincial carbon tax in Alberta. My riding in January is a cold place, and people rightly saw the injustice of a tax on home heating fuel and a tax on families who need to use a car because they cannot walk their kids to the grocery store.

Be assured that now back in Ottawa, I will do everything I can to get the government to finally listen to the people of our community.