Madam Speaker, it is a great privilege to be part of this debate and discussion around the fiscal future, and the economic and social future of our country as we talk about budget 2021. I will be sharing my time with the esteemed member for Vancouver Centre.
A budget is far more than a fiscal plan. It is far more than a set of programs. It is a signature. It is an imprint that this government is making and it is the ability of a government to show what is in its heart, mind and soul. As such, I want to thank the Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of Finance for her tremendous work and for the signature that she has put on this budget; a working mother, a journalist, an economic's writer, a thinker and a careful politician. She is someone who is rooted in her riding, but brings both a Canadian spirit and a world vision to her job, and she has made a difference with the budget. I want to thank her and her whole team for their work.
This budget's imprint is clear. It is about compassion for people, it is about bringing businesses forward after a very difficult time with COVID-19, and it is about doing that with responsibility and with great care.
The people of Don Valley West would benefit from this as would all Canadians, and I speak on their behalf today as we engage in this conversation. Obviously, we are still gripped by a pandemic, by COVID-19, and we are fighting this third wave. The first priority of budget 2021 is to win the fight against the virus, and we need to do that together.
In addition to the significant assistance that our federal government is currently providing all the provinces, including my province of Ontario, in the form of health care, testing, vaccine development and contract tracing and through the buying of vaccines and supporting provincial and territorial health care systems, budget 2021 would enable provinces, territories, municipalities, families and businesses to come out of this very difficult time healthier and stronger.
Proposed funding of up to a billion dollars for Canada's COVID immunization plan will result in continued success of our government's effort to bring more vaccines into Canada and bring them sooner. A one-time top up of $4 billion to the Canada health transfer will crucially help health systems and ensure that Canadians get the procedures and treatments they need to stay healthy as well as clear through the backlog of delayed procedure. Up to $5 billion in health care funding to provinces and territories will ensure the sustainability of our health systems about which we care.
Obviously, we have been gripped by a health crisis that has also been an economic crisis. Through all-party support, in many ways, we have extended an economic hand to businesses, individuals and communities through a variety of programs over these last two years. These programs include the Canada emergency wage subsidy, the emergency rent subsidy, lockdown support, CERB, changes to the EI program and the Canada recovery care benefit. A host of issues and problems addressed through government programs have been successful. They are the reasons that Canadians are doing as well as they are through this very difficult time.
We have also recognized that this pandemic has revealed certain cracks in our society. We have recognized that some populations and groups have been disproportionately affected by COVID-19. Even as we have an enviable position when it comes to our economic recovery and we are in a good fiscal state to take further steps, we still have more to do. We want to find ways to ensure that Canadians, all across the country, from coast to coast to coast, of every economic, social and gender background, are taken care of in a way that looks into the future in a new and promising way.
In my riding of Don Valley West, like across the country, child care costs are extremely high. Toronto has the highest average child care cost of any city in the country and where it can be equivalent to, for some people, making a mortgage payment. It is no wonder that paying for child care represents a significant barrier for families to equally engage in the workplace.
It is a burden on women, but it is also a burden on men, and together we are attempting to make a new program, a new plan for child care, that will change Canada. It is one of the signature items of this budget that we can all rally around regardless of our political stripe. A universal system of child care will be boon to women in the workforce and a boon to men who take their part in child care and child raising.
By achieving a 50% cost reduction in child care by 2022 and $10-a-day child care by 2026 through this budget, we will remove significant barriers to women seeking employment now and even more so by 2026, and it is good economics. It is the only way for Canada to continue to build its economy, to ensure that newcomers are fully engaged in the workforce and that we are able to compete in the world. Given the disproportionate effect of COVID on women, our economic recovery needs to be a feminist recovery. With substantial measures for women's employment along with affordable child care, we will not only recover the employment that we have lost over the last two years, but we will also see further and continued success by women in the workforce.
As I said, this is an opportunity to build back better. Cracks have been revealed in our social safety net and our various systems. We will continue to work on environmental programs, on building the base for small business to recover and ensuring that large businesses are able to compete in the global marketplace.
Housing is core to that as well. People in Don Valley West, especially in neighbourhoods like Thorncliffe Park, depend on affordable housing, and COVID has made it even harder to get. It has widened the gap between Canadians who have housing and those who cannot afford it. Budget 2021 will quickly address creating new housing while at the same creating jobs, alleviating cost pressures on the housing market overall in a variety of methods that have already been mentioned in today's debate, and will grow the middle class. Part of the underscoring of the care for families is to ensure that they not only have jobs but are able to participate in the workforce equally and also that they have a roof over their head.
Many people in Don Valley West did lose their jobs during the COVID pandemic. Some have recovered, but many have not. This is not a time for austerity; it is a time for bold imagination, creativity and ensuring that all Canadians can participate in the workforce. It is not a time to draw back; it is a time to push forward. It is a time to ensure that we are spending appropriately and carefully, doing so with imagination and compassion, and with partners in our cities, provinces and territories, labour unions and businesses. Canada and Canadians have what it takes to make an economy that is competitive in the world. Government needs to be there to undergird it, support it, encourage it and, at times, invest in it.
Most people in the House will know me as a United Church minister and will understand that I try to bring people first in the work I do, but I am also accountant, which was my first career. I come at this budget with an accountant's eye as well as a clergy's eye, and the accountant's eye is very pleased with this budget.
I was very glad that the member for Charleswood—St. James—Assiniboia—Headingley brought up Paul Martin as finance minister in the 1990s. He had to have the budget for his time, which was to undo the fiscal recklessness of the previous prime minister, Mr. Mulroney. He had to find a way to take care of the debt that Mr. Chrétien, as prime minister, had inherited. He had a budget for his time. This is a budget that the Minister of Finance and Deputy Prime Minister has brought for this time; a different budget.
We are not ideologically driven. We are driven by doing the right thing at the right time to invest in the right way. We are taking advantage of our tremendously good banking system; the bones of our economy, which are strong; and the imagination and entrepreneurship of Canadians, which need to be harnessed and brought forward into new and creative ways following this pandemic. We need to do that in a fiscally responsible way. I am glad that we are not afraid of investing, encouraging, enabling, supporting and making sure that our economy is built for the years ahead.
We have looked back, and we are taking care of the present. We have learned from the past and we are taking care of the present, and we are building a country and an economy for the future.
