Jake Stewart

[Economic and Fiscal Update Implementation Act, 2021, February 3rd, 2022]

Madam Speaker, I was hoping I would get this question.

The Conservatives believe in the free market and free market enterprise. No matter how much money the Liberal government continues to spend, rural Internet in my constituency does not improve. The reason is that private companies own the infrastructure, the federal government regulates it and the lines and cables in my riding are attached to public telephone poles. The public owns the poles, the companies own the fibre cable, regulations come from the federal government and the equipment is owned by private companies. This creates monopolies. It puts government in the bad position of being forced to spend its own money, and people do not get a better source of Internet. What I want is top-of-the-line Internet for everyone in my constituency, and if the government is going to spend $540 billion every day I come here, we should have it by now.

[Economic and Fiscal Update Implementation Act, 2021, February 3rd, 2022]

Madam Speaker, what the Conservative Party of Canada is saying right now is that if economists around the world are telling the government not to spend any more money, not to continue the housing balloon and not to cripple Canadians with mounting debt, the Conservative Party of Canada has a responsibility to protect Canadians by trying to hold the government to account so that it does not spend $541 billion extra, some of it with no measures. What I would like to see is lower taxes and incentives for companies, not massive and monstrous public spending by the Liberal government.

[Economic and Fiscal Update Implementation Act, 2021, February 3rd, 2022]

Madam Speaker, I would like to see the bill debated. I would like to see hon. members from every party stand in the House and speak directly to Canadians about the new expenditures and about economic stimulus.

Economists all over are saying that right now we can bounce back. COVID will be over and we can bounce back, but what are the Liberals doing? They are finding an excuse to cripple Canadians with more debt and more inflation. In my riding, people cannot afford to pay any more. They cannot do it.

[Economic and Fiscal Update Implementation Act, 2021, February 3rd, 2022]

Madam Speaker, I will be splitting my time with my great colleague, the member for Kelowna—Lake Country.

I am very proud to speak on Bill C-8 today on behalf of my constituents of Miramichi—Grand Lake. This is yet another bill that enacts tax and spending by the Liberal government.

Unlike some of the members opposite, I understand that if the Speaker delivers a ruling, as an hon. member in this House I am going to be respectful to the Speaker of the House. I am going to tell a little story about what happened just before Christmas before I speak directly to the bill, but the story goes to the spirit of the bill.

The last bill I spoke on was Bill C-2. After about 25 or 30 hours of the finance committee discussing the bill, the Minister of Finance for our country said it would cost $7.4 billion in spending. Then the House adjourned and the committee adjourned, and the minister then visited the Senate committee. It was at that moment that I and other members of the committee and members of the House ascertained that it would not cost $7.4 billion, but $11.9 billion. The members of that team and the other members from the Bloc and the NDP who sat on that committee for somewhere close to 30 hours discussing a $7.4-billion bill realized that the Christmas present left by the Liberal government to the consumers and taxpayers of our country was not a $7.4-billion bill but an $11.9-billion bill. In that, we learned a valuable lesson not only about committees but about what happens when meetings adjourn. The sitting government changed the numbers and informed us and the rest of the country that there was, oops, a little typo and that it was actually going to cost Canadians over $4 billion more.

I wanted to make that point today, because I think it is pertinent to this argument.

It is very important to me to be able to rise in these hallowed halls and bring a truly Canadian perspective, a rural perspective and a Miramichi—Grand Lake perspective.

The current state of affairs is in complete disarray. I am here to talk about more proposed spending of public funds. The traditional tax-and-spend Liberal government is whaling away on the public's money, spending it like there is no tomorrow. This is money that Canadians have no choice but to hand over. It is money they trusted us with. Elected officials are trusted to be the voice and good stewards of the public trust and public spending, but with the government members on the other side of the floor, we have seen money being spent and the bill is going down the road. I have four children and I cannot imagine them paying for the sins of today when not one of them is over the age of 15 right now.

When I read Bill C-8, I saw fuel prices rising to almost $2 a litre in Miramichi—Grand Lake. Bacon is rising more than 20%. Beef is rising more than 20% year over year in Alberta. Bread in Quebec is up 10%. Natural gas bills are up 30% in Ontario alone. We cannot keep printing money and expect different results, because that is inflation. In this House it has become known as “Justinflation”, but it is all inflation. Do members know who pays for it? It is the taxpayers of this country.

I am going to bring to the attention of the House something I find most interesting. I hope the people in Miramichi—Grand Lake and around the country are listening, because I think it is worth listening to.

We have the third-largest oil reserves in the country in Alberta. The government is fixated on what it used to call ozone layer problems, then global warming and then climate change. Now it is calling it a climate crisis, because if there is a crisis, it has to act now. As a result, what it is doing is destroying the very foundation of the Canadian economy.

I am also going to tell the House what it is doing for the taxpayers of this country. We are buying oil that emits more pollution, because it contains higher levels of carbons and has caused a 300% increase of shipments on the sea. We are bringing in oil from the Middle East, from warlord nations, and the Canadian people are paying three times as much for that oil, even though we have oil in our own country. People would have a cheaper oil bill if the Liberals had the common sense to see the error of their ways. There is nothing wrong with having environmental standards. We have the best standards in the world in our energy sector. We are the gold standard of the energy sector, but the Liberals' climate crisis agenda is costing people too much money.

We are here every day and talk about affordability, the cost of living, inflation and the housing balloon. We talk about this every day, but nothing is getting better for Canadians because they continue to pay for the sins of the current government. Let us think about this. We are bringing oil from halfway across the world that emits more carbon than our own. Then we put it on a ship and there are 300% increases to ship it because of the state of the world right now. We are still doing that in this country when we have our own oil. It is shameful that the Prime Minister would do that and try to continue with this global elitist agenda that does not completely apply to the Canadian people. It is dangerous.

Does this make us independent? Does it help create jobs? Do we get any additional revenue? The answer to every one of those questions is no. What do we get? We get a bill: a more expensive bill, a more unaffordable bill, a bill that the Canadian people and the people in my constituency of Miramichi—Grand Lake are having a hard time paying for.

I am going to let the House in on a little secret that those in Miramichi—Grand Lake are well aware of: Canadians are sick and tired of picking up the tab for the government. On one side of the Liberals' mouth, they say we are at a prepandemic level when it comes to jobs and the economy, but on the other side of that same mouth, they are adding $70 billion of new inflationary spending. I do not have to tell members what that is going to do to the pockets of Canadians and to young families who are priced out of the housing market. They cannot get a home. I am 43 years old. People who are 10 or 12 years younger than me who are trying desperately to get a home are having a really hard time getting into new houses because the cost is so high that it is not affordable. Since the start of the pandemic, Canadians have been misled on where the money is coming from and where the money is going.

Last week, during my time on the Standing Committee on Finance, I had the opportunity to ask key questions. Canadians wanted to know from the Parliamentary Budget Officer whether the government, which spent over half a trillion dollars in brand new spending, has misled the rest of us. That was the question. Roughly one-third of this new spending had nothing to do with COVID. It is $178 billion of new printed money for non-COVID-related expenditures.

The Conservatives are opposed to Bill C-8. The economic and fiscal update adds $70 billion of new inflationary fuel right to the fire. The delay in the government's release of its audited financial statements has undermined parliamentarians' ability to meaningfully scrutinize proposed government spending. The Parliamentary Budget Officer report shows that since the start of the pandemic, the government has spent or plans to spend $541.9 billion in new measures, almost one-third of which is not COVID-related.

We are not in support of Bill C-8 because it is another classic tax-and-spend Liberal measure that will only cripple Canadians with more debt and more inflation. The Canadian public is worth more than that, and that is why the Conservative Party of Canada is going to protect their interests regarding public money.

[Questions on the Order Paper, January 31st, 2022]

With regard to government analysis on the impact of the Bank of Canada's low inflation target on the New Brunswick economy: (a) has the government done any projections on the impact of maintaining the low inflation target on New Brunswick's economy, and, if so, what are the results of such projections, broken down by economic indicator; and (b) has the government done any projections on the impact of abandoning the low inflation target on New Brunswick's economy, and, if so, what are the results of such projections, broken down by economic indicator?

[Government Business No. 4—An Act to Provide Further Support in Response to COVID-19, December 16th, 2021]

Madam Speaker, first and foremost, my colleague is misinformed. Second, the one thing we can get from the NDP in the House is that, when push comes to shove, they will vote for the Canadian government and the Prime Minister every single time. They are the reason the Liberals continue to have a minority government.

[Government Business No. 4—An Act to Provide Further Support in Response to COVID-19, December 16th, 2021]

Madam Speaker, obviously, the Conservative Party of Canada will always put seniors first. We know that the Liberal Government of Canada puts nobody first but its friends, with examples such as the WE scandal, the procurement scandals and SNC-Lavalin. There is not enough time. Members can look at what the Liberals have done to seniors. Do I agree with the member? In principle I do.

My colleague opposite and I have in common that we will put seniors first, and we know the Liberal government will put its friends first, along with criminals, prisoners and terrorists.

[Government Business No. 4—An Act to Provide Further Support in Response to COVID-19, December 16th, 2021]

Madam Speaker, supporting businesses and supporting people in need are principles of the Conservative Party of Canada. The issue here is that the Liberals could not tell us where the money was coming from, and they could not tell us how much it would cost to administer. Eventually we got a number close to $200 million, and the Liberals could not tell us if that was within the $7.4 billion, or over and above it.

The Liberal Government of Canada has no concept of what it is doing to the Canadian taxpayers. Do we support businesses? We absolutely do. Do we support people in need? We absolutely do, but we will have oversight over Liberal money.

[Government Business No. 4—An Act to Provide Further Support in Response to COVID-19, December 16th, 2021]

Madam Speaker, it is a pleasure today to speak to Bill C-2. In the last couple of weeks as a member of the finance committee and of the House of Commons, I learned something really interesting. One of the first questions that was asked in committee was, “Where is the money coming from?”

The Liberal government is going to spend $7.4 billion on programs similar to CERB and the other programs in the original suite of benefits it put out during the pandemic. However, we have since learned that some of that money actually bled into criminal organizations. People were able to scam the public's money for criminal intent, and the Liberals are okay with that because just recently they lessened offences for using firearms and other violations.

We know that the Liberal government is weak on crime and soft on criminals. Canadians know this. However, if we look at what the Liberals are doing right now, they are going to take $7.4 billion and dole it out, but they have no oversight of that. The Canada Revenue Agency has no oversight of it. The FINTRAC report showed us that millions and millions of hard-earned taxpayer dollars were scammed by criminals. Other monies went to prisoners. If there were even the potential that those hard-earned Canadian tax dollars bled into terrorist organizations, could members believe the Government of Canada would allow this to happen, but more so, could they believe it would do nothing about it?

The people of Miramichi—Grand Lake do not want to fund terrorist organizations. They do not want to fund prisoners. They do not want to fund organized crime. They do not want to fund criminals in whatever behaviours they are up to, and they certainly do not want to see firearms charges lessened.

The Liberal government right now is sending Canada backward in so many avenues. Let us talk about this first question, which my colleague from Carleton asked at committee: “Where is the money coming from?” The Government of Canada has no concept of where that $7.4 billion is coming from. Eventually it said it is coming from the contingency fund. That is nice, but where did that money come from?

I would like to focus on how that money would be coming from energy revenues. This country is a leader in the energy sector. Whether it is oil and gas, minerals or mining, we are actually a world leader in the development of those industries, and that is where a serious bulk of revenue flows in for our country and its taxpayers. The Liberals are actually funding the CERB and other programs with no oversight using the very tax dollars from the very industries they are trying to kill in front of the rest of the world.

Right now, they cannot solve the softwood timber tariffs. Because the United States needs more oil, they have to go to OPEC and other countries to get help with oil and pipelines. We have to wonder if the Canadian government could say, “We will help you with some oil. Let us build a pipeline together, and by the way, can you take that tariff off our softwood?”

It seems like a general argument. It seems very basic, but I bet the Liberals have not even tried it. They have not tried it because they have no plan for our country. They have no plan for Miramichi—Grand Lake. The only thing they want to do is talk about the climate crisis and having everyone's back. They had the back of the first nations in this country so vastly that they did not even attend the first Truth and Reconciliation Day. They held the flag at half-mast for six months of the year.

We are talking about a government that has no regard for the Canadian public, no regard for the hard-earned taxpayer dollars that are coming from Miramichi—Grand Lake and New Brunswick and the rest of the provinces and territories. We are talking about a government of this country, where the rise in inflation is second in the world.

I am 43 years old. I was fortunate to buy a house built in 1919. I got it in rural New Brunswick. It was very cheap, and I have done a lot of work to it over the years. There are people my age and a little younger than me who are never going to own a house in this country.

I bought a house for $40,000 back in 2006. I could sell that house today for $160,000 or $170,000. I live in a very small town in the middle of rural New Brunswick, where the Internet is terrible and the only industry we ever had was forestry, and I have watched the demise of that over the course of time. If my house went up that much, imagine what a $300,000 house bought in 2005 is worth today. It is probably worth millions of dollars.

People are not going to be able to afford a house in this country. They are not going to have kids. We need to grow our population. I have four children. I can say that having four children in today's Canada is a very expensive endeavour. I would do it all again. I love the fact that I have four children.

However, imagine being 28 or 29 years old today. That person wants to own a home, which should be worth $250,000, but now costs $800,000. They have a partner who wants to have children, and they cannot even afford to have one of them. This is the country that the government is leaving to our children and to the grandchildren we have not met yet. That is wrong.

As a member of the Conservative team, we have to go to committee to make sure that the Canada Revenue Agency is brought in to have oversight of those hard-earned Canadian tax dollars, and to make sure that the Auditor General is coming in to ask those serious questions. It is also so we can ask why they are choosing not to audit the people who scammed Canadians' hard-earned tax dollars.

Why is it happening? How could the Prime Minister of Canada support this endeavour? How could he continue to talk about having the backs of Canadians, when people in their 20s and 30s are never going to be able to own a house in this country? How can he say he has their backs? He is causing this inflation on the cost of housing. The cost of bacon has gone up 30% to 35% just in the past year or two. People cannot even afford bacon anymore.

I think what we have is an abuse of power. We have a Prime Minister, who is out of touch with all Canadians. He is certainly out of touch with rural Canada. He is out of touch with people in Miramichi—Grand Lake.

I have the FINTRAC report right here. I could not believe that it says CEBA-related fraud was carried out in a similar fashion with the loan being transferred from the applicant's business account to their personal account, then withdrawn for cash. We have people in this country who are taking tax dollars for their own benefit. We had a million jobs unfilled, houses that nobody can pay for and food that nobody can pay for.

That is the beauty of being in the House today. I have a good friend here beside me from Nova Scotia. My dad is from Nova Scotia. I have another buddy over here from Newfoundland, and they are here working for the Canadian people who put them here. They are in this House, and they are working for the hard-earned taxpayer dollars to make sure that there is oversight on that money.

The Conservative Party of Canada is the only party that ever had oversight of hard-earned Canadian tax dollars. We have to hold the government accountable because the Prime Minister is out of touch, not just with rural Canada, not just with Miramichi—Grand Lake, but with all Canadians.

We have to ensure that Canadian taxpayer dollars are not funding terrorist organizations, criminal organizations, scam artists and petty criminals. We cannot afford to have the hard-earned dollars of Canadians bleeding into those organizations.

We put forth a motion at committee. The Conservative Party, members of that committee and all members on this side of the House want oversight of the Prime Minister because Canadians are worth it, their tax dollars are worth it, and we have to make sure that we put the Canadian people first.

[Softwood Lumber Dispute with the United States, December 1st, 2021]

Madam Chair, in the last six years, the Liberal government has failed on this issue twice in a row, which has affected softwood lumber in every province. Judging by his business background and the ability to clearly go the distance to win under a lot of different situations, what will he do to win this one?