44th Parl. 1st Sess.
April 4, 2022 11:00AM
- Apr/4/22 12:03:13 p.m.
- Watch
- Re: Bill C-8
Madam Speaker, while the housing crisis is national in scope, regional spikes like the one in Ontario are the reason so many are actually calling Saskatchewan home now. I know of many retirees who cannot afford to remain in Ontario.
One couple, for example, planned a short visit to Saskatchewan but ended up staying permanently. Then they invited their children to bring their families to Saskatchewan. They had six months to live with their parents while they found employment and a new home. Others have also come to Yorkton—Melville from British Columbia and Quebec. Nonetheless, prairie affordability is being threatened by growing inflation, incredible debt and a punitive carbon tax that is definitely costing rural Canadians far more than they are getting back.
Although I love my province and the amazing people who live in it, I do not desire to see other areas of the country suffer from the poor choices of the national government. I want to see Canadians, regardless of financial ability, free to settle anywhere in this beautiful country, but let us face reality: Canadians now have a new majority government in Ottawa.
The survival of the old Liberal government, which initially tabled Bill C-8, now officially relies on the support of a party that has even more reckless intentions to run up debt and does not care how much money it has to print to do so. Unless this political love affair falls by the wayside, Canadians are stuck with this new reality for the next three and a half years.
Despite indifference on the other side of the House, Conservatives will be present ever day to offer solutions to this affordability crisis. For example, Bill C-8 proposes a 1% annual tax on the value of vacant or underused residential properties that are directly or indirectly owned by non-resident non-Canadians. In Calgary, I personally know of a family that rented in a subdivision that is completely owned by a Chinese investor who has never set foot in Canada. Conservatives would have banned foreign investors who are not living in or moving to Canada from buying homes for two years. We also proposed encouraging foreign investment in purpose-built rental housing that is affordable for Canadians. We will also continue to push the government to remove the gatekeepers to development and get shovels in the ground.
Canada's housing crisis is fuelled in large part by the choices of the federal government. It can choose to let the builders build or it can continue to stand in their way. It can choose to rein in spending and lower taxes or continue to allow inflation to spiral out of control.
The government is letting down young Canadians. The new generation of first-time buyers is not looking for flashy slogans, hashtags or photo ops; it wants concrete action from this new NDP-Liberal majority government to address the crisis. The first logical step would be to withdraw this irresponsible bill, which would only put the Canadian dream of ownership further out of reach for young Canadians.
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- Apr/4/22 12:06:16 p.m.
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- Re: Bill C-8
Madam Speaker, I was wondering if the member could expand on affordability. I know I hear from my constituents, almost on a daily basis, of taxes increasing. We know we just had the carbon tax increase here on Friday, and also the excise tax on alcohol. I was wondering if she is hearing the same thing from her constituents on the other side of the province of Saskatchewan about affordability and the cost of living and how it is affecting them.
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- Apr/4/22 12:08:12 p.m.
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- Re: Bill C-8
Madam Speaker, the truth of the matter is that the current government is very self-serving in the way that it is choosing to work with our provinces. It takes advantage of the provinces' need for funding and truly is putting them in a place where it is either the government's way or the highway. This is not acceptable. I am very proud of Saskatchewan and its government in its ability to run our province in its own areas of jurisdiction, and we certainly, as Conservatives, support that.
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- Apr/4/22 12:08:51 p.m.
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- Re: Bill C-8
Madam Speaker, I thank my colleague from Saskatchewan for her speech. In her riding, like mine, the carbon tax is an issue that many Canadians are talking about in terms of affordability and the cost of living.
One of the things I would like the member to comment on when we talk about the government's economic record and its fiscal plan, albeit from this fall looking ahead perhaps to the budget even this Thursday, is the Parliamentary Budget Officer saying that this tax disproportionately impacts rural residents more. It has cost them out of pocket and it is costing families and businesses, and that ripple effect is adding to an already difficult cost-of-living issue here. Could the member take this opportunity to perhaps share the context in her part of the country? Whether in my riding in eastern Ontario in the city of Cornwall or in some of the more rural parts, what I think I am going to hear is that we have very similar challenges and similar frustration on the part of many Canadians.
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- Apr/4/22 12:09:47 p.m.
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- Re: Bill C-8
Madam Speaker, I thank my colleague for that observation and that question.
One thing I have learned as a member of Parliament that means a great deal to me, and I share this with my constituents here in Saskatchewan, is that the majority of the GDP of this nation is created in rural Canada. We are rural, and the issues faced by members of my communities who are facing this carbon tax resonate completely with rural Canadians across this country.
This government does not understand that dynamic, and the punitive measures it has put in place are not revenue-neutral. Certainly I know that my constituents are paying far more into this carbon tax than they are getting back, and it is more punitive towards rural Canadians.
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- Apr/4/22 12:38:43 p.m.
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- Re: Bill C-8
Madam Speaker, I am of the mind that we should respect provincial jurisdiction. In the province I come from, Saskatchewan, Premier Scott Moe has presented two plans to the Prime Minister and the Liberal government on carbon pricing. It is reflective of our local economies, which are energy an agriculture, and takes into account that Saskatchewan is a carbon sink, especially with all the work that our agricultural economy and regions are doing there. I am of the mindset that we should respect provincial jurisdiction. It is disgraceful that when our premier in Saskatchewan presented not one but two plans to the Prime Minister, he said it was his way or the highway and imposed his own.
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- Apr/4/22 12:40:27 p.m.
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- Re: Bill C-8
Madam Speaker, I agree with the member that everything is more expensive and Canadians cannot afford another tax, especially a tax on a tax. It is why I spoke about the federal carbon tax that has been imposed on the residents in Saskatchewan. I have a gas bill here from a constituent of mine named Trevor. His bill was $419. Of that, $96.55 was carbon tax, and the GST on that tax, the tax on a tax, was an additional $4.83. That is over $100, or 25% of his energy bill. Where is it going? We do not know because there is no accountability and it does nothing for the environment. Affordability absolutely needs to be top of mind for the Liberal-NDP government.
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- Apr/4/22 1:26:13 p.m.
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- Re: Bill C-8
Madam Speaker, I had no problem with my colleague continuing on. I appreciate my colleague from Medicine Hat—Cardston—Warner.
It is an honour to rise today to speak to Bill C-8, the economic and fiscal update implementation act, 2021. I would like to thank the people of Moose Jaw—Lake Centre—Lanigan for their overwhelming confidence in sending me to Ottawa to serve them as their member of Parliament. In my maiden speech, I recognized the sacrifices of my family. I would be remiss today if I did not recognize the team of volunteers who door knocked, canvassed, made phone calls and contributed to help get me here today so that true Saskatchewan values have a voice in this House and so that people from Saskatchewan can participate in Confederation and bring a voice of reason to this House.
I want to focus today on something that affects everyone daily but that the government seems to have forgotten about: the skyrocketing costs of living. Last Friday, Canadians got a rude April Fool's joke played on them in the form of a 25% hike to the carbon tax. This means that when I drove to the airport last night, the price of gas in my riding had gone up to $1.68 per litre. This came at a time when inflation had already hit a 30-year high of 5.7%.
The Liberals, when challenged on this issue, always compare us to other countries. I have just witnessed that. We are not here to compare ourselves to others. We are here to fight for the interests of our constituents. Just because inflation here is not as bad as it is in another country does not mean that it is good. The Liberals must address this and take responsibility for it.
Inflation is increasing the cost of everything, including groceries, housing and everyday essentials that Canadians rely on. How did the Liberals decide to try to help Canadians who are already struggling? It was by hiking their taxes yet again. The problem with raising the carbon tax is that it does not just target the cost of gas; it hits everything that is transported or harvested with gas. Essentially, everything we buy is affected. Raising the carbon tax even increases inflation. The Bank of Canada told us recently that the tax accounted for 0.4% of the latest inflation numbers.
A few weeks ago we, the Conservatives, offered a solution to these high gas prices. We proposed a motion to pause the GST on gas. Unsurprisingly, the Liberals voted this down. We are saying, and I have been saying since my maiden speech, that policy needs to be there and exist to help people, not punish them, and hiking the carbon tax during the current inflationary crisis is hurting Canadians. The least the government could do is postpone this tax grab.
The largest contributor to the global economy is the consumer. Those consumers in this case are citizens and taxpayers. Reducing their buying power actually slows down the global economy. This has created a bureaucratic cycle implemented by this Liberal government. How does this happen? The Liberal government taxes someone with one hand and then, with the other hand, gives the money back to them. That bureaucratic cycle costs the taxpayer their hard-earned dollars, because someone has to administer and oversee the tax.
This lost money should be used by consumers to purchase goods and services to support their own households. We see this in every policy that the Liberal government comes up with. It is like going to the carnival and seeing the giant pea and shell game. It is just moving money around. Everyone knows that this is a bureaucratic mess.
Leading up to the federal budget, we are hearing more and more about the number of big-spending promises that the Liberals have made to buy the support of their coalition partner, the NDP, such as national dental care and national pharmacare. On top of these pet NDP causes, we have the Russian invasion of Ukraine that is forcing the government to finally rethink defence spending. I am glad to see that the government is finally buying the F-35s that Stephen Harper, the former prime minister, agreed to buy nearly a decade ago, but it is coming at a higher cost and at a time when Canada will struggle to afford it.
As someone who has served in the Royal Canadian Air Force, increasing Canada's defence spending is something that I wholeheartedly agree with. However, times like this are why we need a prime minister who thinks about monetary policy. A leader who spent any time thinking about it would know that all of these big-spending promises cost Canadians.
The Canadian debt is skyrocketing under the Liberal government. According to the Canadian Taxpayers Federation, the national debt is now over $1 trillion. It is growing by $16 million per hour, and each Canadian's share of it is over $31,000 at this point in time.
My youngest daughter is six years old. We are spending money that her children will be paying back, and probably her grandchildren, too. We expect the government to set an example and be reflective of who we are as a society. We do not remortgage our homes to buy something for ourselves. We mortgage our homes to have a place to raise our families and to leave something to our children when we have paid it off: to leave a legacy. What legacy are we going to be leaving behind at this point? I talked about this theme in my maiden speech. It is our shared responsibility to leave something to our children and to future generations. Leaving them a trillion-dollar national debt is not what I had mind.
Last week, we debated another Conservative motion calling on the government to exercise any semblance of fiscal restraint in the upcoming budget. We voted on that and, unsurprisingly, the NDP-Liberal coalition voted against it. Let us not fool ourselves. Pierre Elliott Trudeau was a member of the CCF: It was the precursor to the NDP, prior to 1965. Now, this coalition is coming full circle and showing the current Prime Minister's true colours. It took this country decades to dig our way out of the debt that Pierre Trudeau left us. How many decades will we be cleaning up his son's mess for?
I would like to spend a bit of time talking about Canadian veterans. I sit on the veterans affairs committee, which has been studying the rising backlog of cases under the current government. The average wait times are bad enough, but they get even worse if people are francophone or female. Heaven forbid if someone is a female francophone. I expect we will see some mention of this in this week's budget; however, I know that it will not be enough to fix the lingering issues. The fact that we are planning to spend nearly a billion dollars on electric infrastructure just shows how out of touch we are, and that we are not focusing on veterans: that number is a sizable chunk of the entire budget for Veterans Affairs Canada that could be used.
I am concerned about the future of our country.
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- Apr/4/22 1:53:41 p.m.
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- Re: Bill C-8
Madam Speaker, the hon. member makes an excellent point. One would think people in Saskatchewan want dental care, and yes, they do, but they do not want to burden their kids with all sorts of expenses they cannot afford. This is a structural change in government spending, so we need tax revenue, not just today but in the future, to pay for it. How we are going to do that? We just shut down the oil and gas sector and we just heard from the manufacturing sector that it is leaving, so what are we going to do? My suggestion, if we want a dental program and pharmacare program, is to maybe get the cash first. Maybe pay for it instead of financing it through deficit and then waiting for somewhere down the road to pay for it.
We talk about the big banks and the people who make tremendous amounts of money with their corporations. Proper taxation is very important, no question about it, but keep in mind that when a big bank makes money, what does it do? It pays out dividends. What do shareholders do? They reinvest it back into the Canadian economy. They buy things, or they borrow from the bank and use the money in their business to function their operating capital. If we want to have fair taxation rates for banks, let us talk about that; let us make that part of the debate. However, why not raise that money first before we start committing Canadians to a structural expense that they may not be able to afford?
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- Apr/4/22 2:36:13 p.m.
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Mr. Speaker, I think it is important that Canadians look at the facts because the Conservatives certainly are not.
Under our plan and our program, a single mother with two children will receive $13,600 from the Canada child benefit, an average family in Saskatchewan will receive nearly $1,000 in carbon tax rebates, and a student will save more than $3,000 thanks to the changes we have made to the program.
This is a plan that allows us to tackle affordability, and that is what we will continue to do on this side of the House.
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- Apr/4/22 6:00:02 p.m.
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- Re: Bill C-8
Madam Speaker, what did we just witness there? We just witnessed a filibuster within a filibuster. They were already filibustering by bringing in this concurrence motion, and then the member stood on a point of order to try to filibuster the filibuster. It is absolutely remarkable what we are seeing, but I will have that member know that I take this as a compliment. I take this as the people in the back room over there saying, “Oh God, there goes Gerretsen again. Somebody get in there and go shut him up. Hey, get in there and read this,” and they handed him something to read so he could filibuster the filibuster. That is what we just witnessed there, but it is perfectly in line with what we see coming from the Conservative Party, day after day, to avoid having to deal with Bill C-8. That is where we are right now, and that is what we are seeing right now.
As I was saying to the member for Sherwood Park—Fort Saskatchewan, before he interrupted me with the filibuster to the filibuster, he should really take a trip to somewhere like Home Depot and walk around inside for a second and see if he can buy a gas lawnmower. It is not easy to find them anymore. The electrification of everything is literally happening before our eyes. Everything is being converted to battery-operated. It is very difficult nowadays to find products, particularly power tools, that are not battery-operated, especially industrial or larger power tools such as lawnmowers, for example.
The same can be said about the vehicles throughout the country. They are moving in a direction. Whether or not Conservatives want to get on board, it is happening. It is happening right before their eyes and it is not something they can control. It has gone past the tipping point. We have gone past the point of no return, so we are either going to get on board with it or we are going to be caught behind.
Will we need oil? We are going to need oil for a long time. There is no doubt about that, and the member for Sherwood Park—Fort Saskatchewan can clap to that, too. We will, but that does not mean that we cannot at the same time look for a way to transition away from oil, and that is what the recommendations in this report that I referenced are doing specifically, by calling on the government to look for those opportunities.
I brought one up that speaks to ensuring that there are charging stations for electric vehicle readiness as part of the efficiency program to help Canadians who live in older houses. This is one of the problems that we have. A lot of older houses will have to be retrofitted to put in the proper infrastructure.
The one I really liked was recommendation 191. This specifically looked at establishing a greater focus on charging infrastructure investment needs by setting up and funding higher one- and five-year targets for electric vehicle charging stations. This is basically calling on the government to move faster than the already prescribed date of 2035 of being all net-zero emitting vehicles. It asks to set a goal to make one million existing apartment and condominium parking stalls electric-ready by 2030, which is incredibly important.
The apartment that I stay in here in Ottawa was only built in 2015, but for some reason the infrastructure was not already put in place for electric vehicles. That is going to have to be retrofitted. To that point, one of the recommendations that I really liked, recommendation 193, was to incorporate zero-emission vehicle requirements into the national building code and energy building code. Why is that so important? It is because most provinces look to the national building code. If we look at the Ontario building code, it is almost a carbon copy of the national building code. It is the same with Quebec's building code. We need national standards because those will then inform the other provincial standards that are out there.
Indeed, there are provinces that just look to the national building code. By encouraging this kind of stuff, which does not cost the government any money, and by putting these into the building code and encouraging that kind of infrastructure to be built now, we are going to be preparing ourselves for the future. That is one of the other recommendations that I really liked seeing in there.
I just want to say how disappointed I am that we got to the point today that we had to have this discussion. It is going to be unanimously approved by the House.
I imagine that will happen when the deferred recorded division takes place, but I find it very troubling that we even had to have this discussion, just as an opportunity for the Conservatives to once again stall the debate and filibuster what was going on so that we cannot deal with Bill C-8. For some reason, they are hung up on the fall economic statement and not letting it pass. At every step of the way, they are literally dragging their feet. They are the only ones still speaking to it. Every other party has given up on it, and 90% of the members from the Conservative Party who stand to talk about it do not even talk about Bill C-8. They talk about every grievance that they might happen to have at that time.
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