James Cumming

[The Budget, April 20th, 2021]

Mr. Speaker, as I mentioned in my speech, there is nothing in the budget that recognizes the importance of this industry that has helped Canada for years and has allowed us to grow our social programs and infrastructure in the country. I am incredibly disappointed there is no recognition of the energy sector in the budget.

[The Budget, April 20th, 2021]

Mr. Speaker, there are two ways to approach this. One is to provide additional funds to seniors and the other way is to stop burdening them with additional costs.

The government has been on the path of continuing to increase the cost of everything. That is as important to seniors as is trying to give them more capital. They are being given more capital to pay for the additional costs they are incurring, because the government is hell-bent on increasing costs for everything. It is time to stop. It is time to make life more affordable for Canadians.

[The Budget, April 20th, 2021]

Mr. Speaker, there is a lot of preamble in that question. Fundamentally, this has to be a negotiated agreement between the provinces. It strikes me that there have been five years to get that done, five years to create something, and we still have nothing.

We have a promise for $10-child care, but a promise to negotiate with the provinces has not happened yet. Yes, I agree there is an opportunity to use choice and there is an opportunity to design a program that works for all provinces, but it has to be with their input.

[The Budget, April 20th, 2021]

Mr. Speaker, yesterday the Minister of Finance introduced her first budget to Canadians in over two years, two years of uncertainty for small businesses trying to plan for an ever more uncertain future, two years of careful spending by new Canadians not aware of the promises they were made entering this country for the first time and two years of economic room for our country's once strong industries that millions of Canadians have relied upon.

Yesterday, instead of delivering a clear, measured and outcome-driven budget, the Minister of Finance gave Canadians a glimpse of the political opportunity this pandemic has provided for her government. The idea of this budget is not to build back better, but to build back bigger, with a large reach of control of government into the individual lives of Canadians. It is full of big promises and expensive programs and, based upon past performance, it will likely lead to disappointing results.

There will be $101.4 billion in new spending, including $30 billion toward a national child care plan. That is an important initiative that Conservatives support, but it should not be one size that fills all and the devil is in the details. The Liberals' big headline, which they are good at, is that $10 a day will be the average cost for child care. This does not mean all Canadians will have access to $10-a-day child care. The government has had five years to develop this plan with the co-operation of provinces and it still has to be negotiated.

Extending pandemic business and health supports until this economy gets back on its feet will of course be required and there is an increase in the federal minimum wage. There are promises for $17.6 billion in green investments. While all of these promises sound wonderful, I am afraid we will again be reminded of the government's failure to deliver on fiscal promises. Six years ago, the Prime Minister's election platform vowed to run modest budget deficits prior to balancing the budget at the end of his first term. The government has since abandoned this goal. It set four annual deficit targets and each of them was missed. The Liberals are masters at the big gesture and bold headlines, but they consistently do not deliver, so why should we believe them about this budget?

In late 2020, the Prime Minister announced that his temporary spending measures would not become a fixture for the federal government. He committed to balancing the budget in the future without any indication of a timeline and while Liberals assert that their accumulated debt is manageable, long-term projections indicate that massive federal stimulus spending during the pandemic will result in deficits for multiple decades.

Remember when Liberals told us they had the best vaccine portfolio in the G7. That was in December and look at where we are now. Canada is getting slammed by the third wave of variants. Canadians are seeing an extension of time between the first and second doses and less than 3% of the population is fully vaccinated. It says it is an open and transparent government. It prorogued Parliament and shut down the ethics, defence and finance committees while shining the light on important scandals, particularly around sexual harassment. In 2015, the federal government vowed to reduce its debt-to-GDP ratio to 27% and that was not done. It failed to deliver on a pledge to end boil water advisories by March 2021 in indigenous communities and that was not done. The Prime Minister told Liberal Party members at a closed event for the Minister of Public Services and Procurement that all Canadians are likely to be vaccinated by June. That is not going to happen.

These failed promises are just the tip of the iceberg. We cannot depend on the government to execute any of its promises and programs. The government must recognize that there can be no implementation of programs, supports or initiatives aimed toward economic recovery without a solution to this health crisis. As the rest of the world continues to receive vaccines and return to a sense of normalcy, Canada has fallen behind, not only in the past few weeks but since the inception of COVID-19.

In the midst of the third wave, Canadians are struggling to cope with the rise of COVID-19 cases with increased lockdowns and the effects of the struggling economy. We are in the middle of the biggest health crisis in Canadian history. The provincial premiers have called for a long-term funding plan that ensures they will have the resources to make sure we are prepared for when, not if, this happens again. There is nothing in this budget that addresses the long-term resiliency of our health care system, which is what the premiers have been asking for.

Canadians are having a hard time coping with the current spike, hospitalizations are up, ICU admissions are soaring, businesses are closed and workers are losing their jobs or having their hours cut. This demonstrates what poor planning and the failure to procure health provisions looks like. It has consequences for Canadians.

The mental health crisis that our communities have been struggling with across Canada deepens. Canadians are worried about their future. In the United States, cases and hospitalizations are dropping. Businesses are opening. They are going out to sports games. That is because the U.S. population is getting vaccinated. Our current situation in Canada was avoidable.

Monday's federal budget outlines how the federal Liberals propose to rebuild the Canadian economy in a way that brings all Canadians along. Apparently the minister does not consider those Canadians who rely on this country's agricultural, energy, forestry, fisheries or other natural resources to be Canadian. Just as the government has continued to do since 2015, Canada's natural resources were ignored in the equation for economic recovery. There is no mention of the energy sector, which is Canada's number one export.

Snubbing the strength of Canada's resource forestry sectors among others, the government has failed to recognize the impact these sectors would have on our battered economy. The world wants and needs more of our natural resources and we should be thinking about expanding market share rather than hastening its decline. The least we could do is lessen our dependency on foreign supply because we have it all here.

The budget continues to go down a path we have seen before with Liberal governments, funding programs that they believe will increase productivity and innovation, but past results tell a different story. Canada fell out of the top 10 ranking of the world's most competitive economies and we have fallen near the bottom of our peer group on innovation, ranking 17th, with those existing programs that the Liberals are adding money to. How is this federal spending going to position our country for post-pandemic success? In never-before-seen stimulus spending, where is our strategic economic vision for the future? How will this affect generations for years to come? On the debt the government is holding now, we are paying about $20 billion in interest, soon to be $40 billion. How are we going to pay for our debt burden if interest rates continue to rise?

Debt-to-GDP ratio is going to rise and it is getting close to that near default number in 1996. Titled “A Recovery Plan for Jobs, Growth, and Resilience”, the federal Liberal government's budget contains $497.6 billion in total spending. However, from what I was able to distinguish from the speech, there is no actual plan for job growth that they are referring to. Instead there are vague references to growing green jobs and retraining the workforce toward new jobs. We have heard lots of noise about retraining for jobs that do not exist yet. The need for tradespeople only happens if we can approve something and get it built in this country. Growth has to be led by the private sector. The high cost of doing business in Canada, with red tape and over-regulation, creates an impossible environment for small business. There is nothing here that reduces import costs and increases competitiveness.

There is nothing in the budget that deals with the attraction of investment into Canada, nothing that demonstrates Canada is open for business and if we want something or need something built, Canada is the place to do it. There is nothing here that would encourage Canadians themselves to invest in Canadian businesses and little mention of advancing projects that are under review and accelerating that review.

My fear for the future is that this budget will do more than invest massive sums of money into under-tested, under-productive schemes that serve the government's political agenda. Canadians need more than a plan to keep them home and promises to retrain them for jobs that do not exist. They need a plan that will get them outside and back to work. At the end of the day, Canadians will be left with more joblessness, higher taxes and an unimaginable tax burden for Canada's youth.

The most important investment our country can make is getting Canadians employed in our country. The Conservative Party of Canada would implement the Canada recovery plan, a plan that would recover the hundreds of thousands of jobs lost in the hardest-hit sectors. It is time we start building, producing and growing in Canada again. Clearly the rest of the world is interested in buying value-added products, commodities and Canadian expertise, but there is little in the budget that demonstrates our future will include an economic recovery that plays to our strengths.

All in all, there appear to be a few positive measures in this budget put forward, specifically those that will continue to support Canadians in their time of need as they struggle to get through this pandemic. Nonetheless, our party will be sure to scrutinize and review the budget in great detail. Canadians deserve a robust plan for recovery and one that will instill confidence in our ability to grow and build back stronger than ever before.

[Finance, April 16th, 2021]

Madam Speaker, Canada's debt load is among the highest per capita of developed nations. With the spending announcements and budget coming on Monday, there does not seem to be any stopping this massive buildup.

The Prime Minister continues to boast that he has Canadians' backs. Is there any chance he will come clean next week and explain to our grandkids that it will be on their backs to pay it all back?

[Economic Statement Implementation Act, 2020, April 14th, 2021]

Madam Speaker, it is a great question. Why did they fail? It is because of their design. They bring out these programs in rapid fashion, make an announcement and say the details are to follow. Once the details follow, the private sector says that it does not work for the need. It is time the government got serious about designing programs that actually will result in outcomes, and we see that with our high unemployment rate and high spending rate. We are not getting the outcomes we need and Canadians deserve, so it is time the government does a better job than what they have been doing to date.

[Economic Statement Implementation Act, 2020, April 14th, 2021]

Madam Speaker, I absolutely understand. I come from Alberta, and I understand what jurisdiction lies with the province and with the federal government. What the federal government should not do is impose additional regulations and additional burden on these projects to try to stop that investment coming back into the provinces. It is time that we got things built in this country again, and whether it be in Quebec, Alberta or the Maritimes, it is time that we encouraged investment into this country and allowed industry to start to build things again.

[Economic Statement Implementation Act, 2020, April 14th, 2021]

Madam Speaker, I am fully aware. I spent over 20 years of my life in the construction industry. I can tell members the federal government does take a role in providing regulations that could potentially delay the ability to get a permit. It is not just about the permits at a municipal level; it is about the federal government interacting in a jurisdiction with regulations that make it even more difficult to get anything done in this country.

[Economic Statement Implementation Act, 2020, April 14th, 2021]

Madam Speaker, I rise virtually in the House today to speak to Bill C-14, a second act respecting certain measures in response to COVID-19. Before I get into the specifics of the bill and economic recovery, we must all recognize that there is no feasible way that we as a country can make any kind of significant recovery efforts without addressing and conquering this health crisis.

Small businesses will continue to flounder and shut their doors. New graduates who once looked toward the future with optimism will continue to send in job applications with no response. Single-parent households will continue to struggle, trying to make ends meet with the $2,000 government cheques they receive that are meant to justify the fact that they cannot return to work and provide for their children.

I cannot believe I am saying this, but currently Canada ranks far below our international peers per capita for full vaccinations. Last week, Canada made headlines worldwide in the most embarrassing way when CNN reported that we were outpacing the U.S.A. for COVID infections. Canada is behind all kinds of countries in vaccinations. Canadians need to be using all the tools available to fight COVID-19. We need vaccines, we need rapid tests and we need the information to secure our future and rebuild our economy.

The Conservatives want to see the Liberals succeed in securing these tools for Canadians, especially the vaccines, but the Liberals have failed to secure made-in-Canada vaccines until the end of 2021. For the rest of 2021, Canada's vaccine rollout will be at the whims of foreign countries and companies.

It is clear the Liberal government was late in ramping up vaccine manufacturing. Canadians deserve better than this, but why did the Liberal government wait so long to act? Why did it decide to partner with China? We are so frustrated at the government's failure to secure vaccines and get them to Canadians. We cannot secure jobs and cannot secure our economy until Canadians are vaccinated.

The singular focus of the government at this point in time should not be on buyback programs or small infrastructure projects. It should be all hands on deck to procure vaccines that it failed to deliver to Canadians so we can get back to normal like the rest of the world is heading toward.

The U.S., the country right next door, recognized the importance of vaccines and therapeutics early on, investing $20.5 billion for their development. Earlier this month, the U.S. moved the country's active travel advisory for Canada to very high. I appreciate the Liberals' current interest in this area, but it is unfortunate that it comes at such a late stage in the game. Supporting individuals and businesses in the way they currently are, while important, is not sustainable. We have to have strategies and a plan to protect those who are compromised and get the economy back on track.

Bill C-14 was the government's attempt, during the fall economic statement, to put forward a plan for Canadians that would instill hope and confidence in this country's ability to recover. However, given how poorly the government's vaccine plan panned out, I fear that the economic recovery will yield results that are nearly as dismal.

Just as my Conservative colleagues voted in favour of providing assistance to Canadians early on in the pandemic, of course we will continue to recognize the need for assistance in these unprecedented times.

Bill C-14 has introduced some temporary and immediate support for low- and middle-income families who are entitled to the Canada child benefit. The bill would ease the burden of student debt to 1.4 million Canadians by eliminating the interest on repayment of the federal portion of Canada student loans and Canada apprentice loans for up to a year. It would also provide funding for part of the new safe long-term care fund to provide support to long-term facilities, which is critical and very important. There would be up to $262 million for COVID initiatives, including testing, research for countermeasures, vaccine funding and developing border and travel measures. These are all worthy. The bill would also formally provide that an expense such as rent can qualify as an eligible expense under the Canada emergency rent subsidy when it comes due so businesses can access the subsidy before the expense is actually paid.

With the dramatic increase in the amount the bill dictates the government can borrow, which is more than $700 billion and $100 billion in discretionary spending, one would assume that this would carve out a path for Canadians to get back to work. However, as mentioned before, any attempt to recover will be thwarted unless we can get vaccines into Canadians' arms. Only then can we meaningfully talk about recovery.

Like my colleague, the member for Carleton, passionately reminds us, it is the dignity that comes with earning a paycheque and the freedom that comes with the ability to control one's own finances. At the moment, Canadians are experiencing joblessness worse than the G7 average. This gives me absolutely no confidence that offering another $100 billion in discretionary spending would yield any type of meaningful result.

Although we experienced recent job growth, there is no doubt again that those jobs created would be lost again because of the shutdowns due to the COVID-19 variants. We need a plan to come out of COVID, create jobs and get our economy back on track. That cannot happen without people earning paycheques. We cannot permanently put our economy on the national credit card. Our jobs will provide Canadians with personal financial security. Jobs afford families good child care, housing, post-secondary schooling, nutrition and recreation. Jobs provide tax revenue, reduce government debt burden and protect our cherished social net.

Integral to our build-back, but equally important to sustain our country's growth, are two metrics that have been falling over the past few years: Canadian competitiveness and Canadian innovation. With a country of our size and sparsity of population, there is no way we can rely on just our internal economy to lead us to recovery. Canada is going to need massive growth and exports to fuel any kind of recovery and provide the capacity to repay our enormous debt. Spending and infrastructure should be predominantly focused on those things that improve productivity, competitiveness and access to markets. Private sector innovation is what is going to lead us into the future and provide us with the technology we need to both shift to global sustainability and reinstate ourselves as a world economic leader.

In Bill C-14, there is no mention of the resource sector, which is Canada's number one export, nor does it recognize the importance of this sector for our recovery. The world wants and needs more of our natural resources and we should be thinking about how we can expand our market share instead of hastening its decline. With the abundance of natural resources we have been blessed with, we have been handed the keys to the castle. The least we could do is plan for a lessening of our dependence on foreign supply because we have it all right here.

We fell out of the top 10 ranking for the most competitive economies. We have fallen near the bottom of our peer group on innovation, ranking 17. In 2019, mineral fuels, including oil, accounted for 22% of our country's total exports, the number one exported product, and we have the third-largest reserves. We have enormous potential in minerals, agriculture, forestry, pulp and paper.

My colleague, the member for Abbotsford, offered eight specific recommendations to help drive the economy and get people back to work. Here are five more for free.

The government could fast-track decisions on the $14-billion LNG gas project in Quebec, on top of another $6 billion in similar projects waiting for sign-off across Canada.

The government could speed up approval for job-creating projects large and small. The OECD ranks Canada number 34 out of 35 OECD countries on the amount of time it takes to obtain a permit for a general construction project. All three levels of government must commit to provide the world's fastest permits for factories, shopping centres, parks, mines and more. Canada should be the place to build projects.

The government could ensure infrastructure is targeted toward productivity and competitiveness.

The government could unlock the innovation and technology sector, the quantity and quality of R and D, IP protection and strength, and immigration policies that attract talent, and make sure we support these industries that desperately need more people.

The government could repeal the tanker ban on the west coast, a project that had indigenous backing and would have opened up the Asian market.

At the end of the day, the government has an entire toolbox of tools at its disposal. It has a spending account in excess of $700 billion. It has access to the most educated population on the planet. It has more land than it knows what to do with and resource potential beyond compare. It has absolutely everything it needs to get this country well on its way to recovery, just like other countries with much less have done. We can all bounce back if it so wishes. The question will be whether it wants Canadians to emerge from this pandemic reliant on their government and receiving cheques from the state each month or resilient, thanks to their government and the strategic steps it took, able to rebuild from this tragedy with a new-found sense of strength and pride in both themselves individually and the will of the country.

[Digital Charter Implementation Act, 2020, March 26th, 2021]

Madam Speaker, what kind of assurance has the government received that the legislation, as drafted, will be GDPR-compliant, because business needs that certainty.