Mr. Speaker, thank you for your intervention. Indeed, there seem to be some conversations happening while we are trying to speak, which makes it difficult to understand one another.
I was saying that the carbon tax is the Conservatives' bogeyman, which they like to trot out every chance they get. This strategy seems to have worked well, since the Conservatives used that bogeyman on a daily basis against the NDP between 2011 and 2015, as members will recall. They used to say that we were going to put a tax on carbon and that it would cause an economic apocalypse in Canada. Then, in 2015, we suddenly had a Liberal government and it, too, wants to put a price on carbon. I congratulate the Conservatives on their strategy, for it seems to have worked well.
The Conservatives still seem convinced that that is the best way to convince Canadians to vote for them. We will see next year. However, the bogeyman that they keep trotting out year after year does not seem to be working very well. Even so, according to the motion, the carbon tax is to blame for nearly every possible thing that could go wrong for Canadians.
Many things have gone wrong, of course, as we know. We have been here every time since the beginning to point out the many missteps that the Liberal government has made since 2015. However, by constantly trotting out the carbon tax bogeyman, the Conservatives are treating Canadians like idiots who can be fooled into believing that just one thing is to blame because they do not understand how economics work.
I invite my colleague from Portneuf—Jacques-Cartier to explain that to Canadians later on. He can do it in his speech, if he likes. However, what I want to explain today is that we cannot blame the carbon tax for all of our misfortunes.
The motion mentions certain misfortunes and failures. It talks about the Liberals' many failures in the energy and automotive sectors. On that note, we are the first to sympathize with auto workers in Oshawa and across Canada who are affected by the closure of the plant. The closure will affect more than just the place where the final product is assembled. It will also have an impact on related industries and suppliers of the raw materials and parts needed for assembly. The Oshawa plant will stay open for one more year. Sadly, we know that GM has decided to close this plant, even though it is widely recognized for its performance and quality. This is a very disappointing decision, and we were deeply saddened by this recent announcement.
Besides that, the Liberals also failed to have tariffs removed from steel and aluminum when they were getting ready to sign the new deal with the United States and Mexico. Unfortunately, the only bargaining chip the Prime Minister could come up with was to tell the Americans that unless they removed the steel and aluminum tariffs, he would skip the official signing ceremony photo op. That was the only leverage he had against the U.S. President. He could tell the Americans that if they did not do as he wanted, he would not show up for the photo op.
That worked well as a negotiating strategy. A few days ago, he ended up at the official signing ceremony getting his picture taken with the U.S. President and the outgoing President of Mexico, to the dismay of the many steel and aluminum workers, who are also victims of the Liberals' failures.
The Conservative motion also mentions the forestry sector. The forestry sector is calling for the unfair tariffs also weighing on that industry to be lifted. Unfortunately, the Liberals were unable to get anything done. Let us not forget that the problem started under the previous Conservative government, but the Liberals have been slow to fix the problem ever since.
In the renegotiation process with the Americans, the Liberals could have used this situation as leverage to try to break the impasse. Unfortunately, this is just another failure to add to the Liberals' record.
The motion barely mentions farmers, and I do not understand why. They are the ones most affected by the new free trade agreement with the United States and Mexico. For reasons that I do not know, the Conservatives only mentioned the carbon tax in the paragraph on farmers. There they go again trotting out their bogeyman, as if the carbon tax were responsible for all farmers' woes. They did not even mention the new breach in the supply management system.
I was wondering why the Conservatives did not mention the supply management system in their motion when it is what most angers farmers right now, especially those subject to that system. Then I remembered that it was the Conservatives who negotiated and signed the comprehensive economic and trade agreement with Europe, which gave up 3% of our dairy market, and the agreement for trans-Pacific partnership, which opened a 3% breach. The Liberals have just given up another 3%. In total, we have lost 10% of our supply-managed market. Perhaps that is why the Conservatives did not mention supply management in their motion. Perhaps they are ashamed that they did the same thing a few years ago.
During those negotiations, the Conservatives opened supply managed markets, promising compensation, just as the Liberal government is doing today. The Liberals are singing from the Conservative song sheet. The Conservatives knew that these breaches would hurt farmers and that opening major sections of the dairy market would have a significant impact, but they said that they would provide compensation. The Liberals are singing the same tune and supply managed farmers do not like it.
Farmers are seeing breach after breach being opened, weakening our supply management system to the point where no one knows how much more it can take. The Liberals are claiming to have made it through the negotiations without completely sacrificing the system, but the breaches they have opened have severely undermined it. Eventually, it will become so weak as to be called into question. A former Conservative member is already casting doubt on supply management. Who knows how many other Conservative MPs are getting ready to stand up and join the hon. member for Beauce in calling for an end to this system, which serves our regions and farmers so well. I will not get into that debate today since I have only two minutes left.
The Conservative motion is essentially a grab bag of Liberal failures, and, unfortunately, it sets out very few solutions to the problem. According to the Conservative speeches that I have heard so far, the problem seems to be a lack of competitiveness with the Americans. I would argue that cutting taxes is far from the only way to make a country more competitive. Here are two important points to keep in mind. First, our health care system gives us a significant competitive edge over the Americans. That is important. Businesses need to take the health care system into account when they are looking at where to invest. The education system is also an excellent example. Obviously the Conservatives never bring up those points. They never say that we need to strengthen our health care or education systems. Those are non-issues as far as they are concerned.
When we talk about competitiveness with the Americans or any other country in the world, it is important to consider a universal pharmacare program. The Liberal government was supposed to have already implemented such a program. This is not something that they should put off until the next election. When employees have access to an affordable universal public pharmacare program, it makes businesses more competitive. We also need an affordable and accessible child care system. These types of systems would make us more competitive with foreign countries, such as the United States.
When we talk about competition for investments from around the world, we need to consider these solutions. We should not focus exclusively on the tax or carbon tax bogeyman, which is unfortunately what the Conservatives are doing.
