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House Hansard - 44

44th Parl. 1st Sess.
March 23, 2022 02:00PM
Context: House Hansard - 44 - Mar/23/22
Ms. Rachel Bendayan (Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister of Tourism and Associate Minister of Finance, Lib.)
  • Mar/23/22 6:57:37 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, I and our entire government are fully aware that many Canadians are feeling the effects of inflation, including higher prices for groceries and heating. The response that the minister gave was simply to put it into context. Of course, Canadians are seeing price increases at the grocery store, but this is due to circumstances entirely out of our control. We are actually, at the moment, facing unprecedented global inflation, because the world economy is reopening after the pandemic, because there is a war at the moment at the very foot of Europe. Ukraine is known as the breadbasket of Europe for a reason, and the war is absolutely having an impact on food prices around the world. I would also like to remind the member opposite that Canada's inflation remains lower than the OECD average. It remains lower than the G7 average and lower than the G20 average. We here in Canada and as a federal government are doing our utmost, and the numbers prove it, to protect Canadians from this global inflationary pressure. I would also like to remind the House that economists from the Bank of Canada and the private sector believe that inflation will remain a little higher for a little longer than originally expected. However, they expect it to progressively drop to a target of 2% over the next two years. I think it is important to remember that. What is more, I would like to remind my colleague that it is thanks to the federal government that Canadian workers were able to continue receiving their pay cheques during the pandemic. The reason we put so many programs in place was to ensure that Canadians could keep putting food on the table. It is because of our support and our avoidance of austerity policies during the pandemic that Canada is seeing a rapid and resilient recovery right now, with growth of 6.7% in the last quarter. Our recovery plan is targeted towards growth and job creation initiatives that will help boost supply and increase space for the economy to grow without the risk of higher inflation in the future. My colleague also referred to what he called the “carbon tax”, but we on this side refer to it as “the price on pollution”. I would like to address that specific point by saying that the climate action incentive does fully compensate Canadians for that additional tax. Any surplus that the government, as my colleague said, “pocketed”, would not come from the pockets of Canadians but from businesses. I will also highlight a number of specific programs that we have recently put in place. Agriculture and Agri-Food Canada supported emergency food programs, such as the emergency food security fund, the local food infrastructure program and the surplus food rescue program. Building on an investment of $250 million to support local initiatives to fight food insecurity, we announced, in budget 2021, an additional $140 million through the emergency food security fund and local food infrastructure fund to support organizations working to enhance healthy and nutritious food for Canadians. As members can see, our government is absolutely seized with this issue. We have already worked to address the cost-of-living increase, and we will continue to do so.
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