SoVote

Apr/26/22 11:36:36 a.m.
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Qujannamiik, Uqaqtitiji. I would like to thank the member for Richmond Hill for focusing on housing. As I have mentioned many times, indigenous housing is a major issue and a dire need in many of our communities. I had the privilege of visiting a family in one of my constituent communities in Kugluktuk. There were 13 people living in a three-bedroom unit. Does the member agree with me that everyone in the House needs to do better to advocate for more indigenous housing? Will the Liberal government commit to do more than what it promised? I realize there was an increase of $4.3 billion, but that is not sufficient to meet the housing needs of indigenous people.

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Mr. Majid Jowhari

Apr/26/22 11:37:25 a.m.
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Madam Speaker, I want to thank the hon. member for acknowledging the $4.3-billion investment that has been earmarked for the indigenous community. I agree with the hon. member that we need to do better, and we will continue to do better. I continue to be an advocate very much the same as the rest of my colleagues on this side of the House.

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Mr. Kelly McCauley (Edmonton West, CPC)

Apr/26/22 11:37:54 a.m.
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Madam Speaker, I am pleased to rise to join the debate on budget 2022. I think it is the fifth budget I have been able to debate since arriving at this place. This seems to be another case with the Liberal government of “if at first you don't succeed, try and try again”, duplicating past budgets with lots of spending and lots of added debt, but with a poor outcome. I think in the case of the government, though, the saying should be “in case you don't succeed, spend and spend again”. I want to touch on three major items in today's budget. The first is housing. It is no surprise that I want to talk about housing, and it is covered a tiny bit in the budget. We know there is a housing crisis of prices in Canada right now, an affordability crisis, and I want to read a couple of quotes from the housing minister. In February, just a couple of months ago, he said, “We have ensured that we have housed 1.1 million Canadians since the beginning of this government.... We have built over 480,000 units of housing through the...the national housing strategy.” Two months later, just last month, he said they spent $72 billion and have housed two million people. In two months, he claimed in the House, we have gone from 1.1 million Canadians housed to two million. That is 900,000 additional Canadians housed in just two months. Unfortunately, it is not true. Here are the facts, and this is from the Parliamentary Budget Officer. This is not me making up this information, nor pundits. This is actually from the Parliamentary Budget Officer. Across the country we know the average house price has doubled since 2015. The Parliamentary Budget Officer stated that funding for housing programs intended to help low-income households has, under the government, actually decreased 15% in purchasing power. The government will stand and tell us to look how much money it has spent. It has spent all these billions, but we know that there is an inflation problem. We also know there is a housing affordability problem, with prices going up. The Parliamentary Budget Officer himself has said that the money put in by the government, based in real dollars, is down 15%. He further stated that since 2015, there has been a 42% reduction under CMHC's low-income housing units for houses that have been supported. Again, just in April, the housing minister said two million Canadians have been housed, up 900,000, miraculously, from two months earlier. However, here we have the Parliamentary Budget Officer noting a 42% decrease. The PBO further states that CMHC's shift to capital contributions over affordability assistance, like rent assistance, means that little short-term relief is actually delivered to Canadians. Further, he says that while these capital contributions are spread out over time, even when looking at the long term, the actual result in lowering rents for Canadians is very little and maybe not worth the investment. The PBO also states that there are as many Canadians living in vulnerable housing now as there were in 2015, after $30 billion to $72 billion. It is hard to say how much because the housing minister changes the numbers each time he stands to speak. It is $30 billion in one moment and then $72 billion. Say it is on the low side, at $30 billion in spending. What do we have for it? We have as many Canadians in vulnerable housing as we did in 2015. Homelessness in Edmonton has actually doubled in the last couple of years under the government. I want to get to the second part: growth and the economy. What has $1.4 trillion in debt, hundreds and hundreds of billions in added debt, by the government gotten us? The finance minister stands in this House, just as she did yesterday, and states that we have the highest GDP growth according to the IMF. Well, according to the IMF, with numbers that come directly from the IMF website, in 2021, the year the minister claimed we were number one, we were actually fifth in the G7 for growth. We are second in 2022. In 2023, the IMF predicts we are going to below the advanced economy average for growth. Think about that. In 2021, we were fifth in the G7. That is after a 67% increase in the price of oil. Here we have our economy surging because of the price of oil and we are still fifth. In 2022, we are seeing another 12% increase in the price of oil, yet we are still not at the top in the G7. There is an OECD report out called “The Long Game”. It says that Canada is going to have the worst-performing advanced economy from 2030 to 2060. When I was reading through this report and saw we are going to be the worst from 2030 to 2060, I thought maybe we will be okay from 2022 to 2030. Then I read the next page and it said that oh, by the way, from 2020 to 2030 Canada is going to have the worst-performing economy in the OECD as well. This is the OECD; this is not me. These are real numbers from the OECD. In that same report, the OECD talks about productivity. Canada is going to have one of the worst productivity improvements in the OECD. Part of the name of the budget is “A Plan to Grow Our Economy”. This gets back to my comment about the government: “If at first you don't succeed, try and try again”. The Liberals have been trying for years and years and spending more and more, and what do we get? We get what the OECD says is going to be the worst-performing economy in the OECD. Turkey, Greece and second world countries are all going to have higher economic growth than Canada. I will go on to the environment. Here is a quote from our environment minister from January 31: “I would like to remind him that over the past few years, our government has implemented more than 100 measures and invested $100 billion in the fight against climate change.” What are these 100 measures brought in by the government and this $100 billion, as the environment minister claims? According to Stats Canada and the Library of Parliament, GHG emissions have actually risen every year under the government. Therefore, $100 billion of taxpayer money is spent and there are 100 new regulations and programs, but we get higher GHG emissions. I wonder where we would be if the government had done nothing. I think we would be a lot better off. I want to get back to another claim by the finance minister. Besides saying we have the fastest-growing economy in the G7, she talks about our GDP growth being the highest in the G7. What she leaves out is that this is not what we call real GDP growth, which is the real growth when we take inflation out of the GDP. When we take out our out-of-control inflation, we actually drop quite a bit in the G7. We are not the top, as the Liberals claim. Adjusted for inflation, OECD numbers say we are the fifth in the G7 for economic growth. We heard today claims about the debt-to-GDP ratio. We notice the Liberals always say “net debt-to-GDP” or they just say “debt-to-GDP”. They do not talk about the gross debt-to-GDP. Do members know why that is? When we take the real debt or the gross debt, we are not the best in the G7, we are not the second and we are not the third. We are actually the fourth. When we look at the developed nations of the OECD, we are the ninth worst out of 38 for debt-to-GDP. What is the difference between what the Liberals are claiming and the truth and reality? In net debt, they include the half a trillion dollars in assets of the CPP and the Quebec pension plan. They do not count the liabilities and all the money put aside by our parents, ourselves and our grandparents. They do not include that liability, but they include the money they have set aside. The government is therefore not counting every penny set aside for someone tomorrow, next year or in 10 years when it makes the claim of how great our financial situation is. Other OECD nations do not record the net amount like we do, so it is a false statement. It is unfortunate that the government continues to mislead Canadians on how bad things are with our debt, which actually has to be eventually repaid one day, one would hope. Obviously, we are in a problem here in our nation. We have an aging population, no growth coming and an out-of-control deficit. Canada needs better, and that is why I will not be supporting budget 2022.

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Mr. Kevin Lamoureux (Parliamentary Secretary to the Leader of the Government in the House of Commons, Lib.)

Apr/26/22 11:47:43 a.m.
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Madam Speaker, anyone listening to the member opposite could very easily get quite depressed. I do not think that Canadians need to be as worried as the member tries to portray. A lot can be twisted around in the numbers, so let me share a couple of reality numbers for jobs. Jobs are important, and today our unemployment is at record lows. We would have to go back generations to get a lower unemployment rate. Do not quote me on this, but I believe it is right around 5.5%. It was many years ago that we had that sort of unemployment rate. When we talk about the issue of inflation, which gets a lot of airtime here, it is important to recognize that there is a global situation, whether it is the pandemic or the war in Russia. The inflation rate is higher in the U.S. It is also higher, in terms of the average, in the European Union countries. Would the member provide his thoughts on those two statistics?

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Mr. Kelly McCauley

Apr/26/22 11:48:55 a.m.
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Madam Speaker, my hon. colleague fails to mention something, and this is what the Liberals do. They will make a statement, knowingly twisting reality. They say we have the lowest unemployment we have had, but our unemployment is about 60% higher than in the United States. The U.S. has all these demographic and racial issues; it has all these problems, yet our unemployment here, despite massive spending, is 60% higher. Our unemployment is higher than England's. Our unemployment is higher than Japan's. Sure, it is better than it was perhaps a year ago or two years ago, but when we compare it to our peer countries, our unemployment is very, very high. The member opposite should be more forthright when he talks about such numbers.

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Mr. Denis Trudel (Longueuil—Saint-Hubert, BQ)

Apr/26/22 11:49:49 a.m.
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Madam Speaker, I tend to agree with my colleague's criticism of the government's inconsistent housing figures. The government admits defeat on the housing crisis right in the budget. The government admits that its proposal will not be enough. The Liberals claim that 3.5 million homes need to be built by 2031. I do not know where they got that figure of 3.5 million, but that is what they said. The government said that Canada currently constructs 100,000 homes and that it will double this number. This 100,000 figure is not real. It does not exist. The National Housing Council said that 35,000 homes have been built since 2017. Say it were true that 100,000 homes have been built. This government is suggesting that 200,000 be built, but 200,000 a year for the next 10 years is just two million homes. The government says that we need 3.5 million homes, but this will not happen. It is basically admitting that it will fail. What are my colleague's thoughts on that?

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Mr. Kelly McCauley

Apr/26/22 11:50:39 a.m.
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Madam Speaker, I agree with my colleague, and it has been disinformation from the government. We heard the housing minister in February talk about 1.2 million Canadians housed by his government. Two months later, it is two million Canadians. One moment it is $32 billion spent, and the next moment it is $70 billion. The reality is that we have a housing shortage. We built fewer houses in the last six years, since the government came to power, than any of our peer nations in the G7. What the government is doing is not working. It has to change track. It should listen to us, to colleagues with the Bloc and to colleagues with the NDP. What the government is doing is not working and it needs to change track to help Canadians, not just its political fortunes.

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Mr. Mike Morrice (Kitchener Centre, GP)

Apr/26/22 11:51:27 a.m.
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Madam Speaker, I understand that the member for Edmonton West is quite concerned with debt and that the cost of housing is increasing in his community, as it is in mine. My question for him is on his level of openness when we talk about addressing house flippers and speculators in terms of new revenue options, whether it is increases to a vacancy tax or reducing capital gains exemptions for second, third and fourth homes. Can he comment on these as additional ways to reduce the speculation in the market and increase revenue to do more for affordable housing?

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Mr. Kelly McCauley

Apr/26/22 11:52:01 a.m.
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Madam Speaker, I respect the question and where my colleague is going. The reality is that Canada has a shortage, and that is not going to be fixed with taxes. It is not going to be fixed with the home equity tax the Liberals seem to keep funding studies of, but by addressing the supply issue. We need to get government out of the way. We need more supply built. We see it in our G7 peer countries that have proper supply. They do not have the housing crisis, the affordability crisis, we have now. The best thing we can do is get government out of the way and build more houses.

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Mrs. Shelby Kramp-Neuman (Hastings—Lennox and Addington, CPC)

Apr/26/22 11:52:41 a.m.
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Madam Speaker, budgets are important. They are the core of a parliament. It is a real honour to be able to rise here today and speak to budget 2022. For many of us, this is the first substantive piece of legislation that we as new parliamentarians are tasked with scrutinizing. The importance of this job that Canadians have trusted us to undertake cannot be understated. Every single day, many people from Hastings—Lennox and Addington are calling and emailing my office with grave concerns about how they can make ends meet. Just last week, our office received hundreds of feedback forms indicating that the cost of living and affordability was their number one concern. The cost of groceries, gas, home heating and everything has increased. It is my obligation and my role as their member of Parliament to bring them a voice in this House. On general spending measures, the Liberal government suggests that the announcements in the budget will help weather inflation and make housing more affordable. In my opinion, the continuation of this Liberal approach is destined to drive us right back into a crisis of an order of magnitude larger than that of the early 1980s, based on constantly adding new permanent spending programs on borrowed money. As noted in an article I read recently, only a small portion of our national debt is refinanced each year, so we will not get stung all at once. However, year by year, servicing costs will rise and the ability to afford our essential programs will dwindle, unless taxes rise substantially to cover the rising costs of both debt serving and increased program costs. The core function of our Parliament has been, and remains, to oversee the expenditure of public monies. Parliamentarians, and parliaments themselves, fought long and hard to pry this authority from the hands of imperial executives and governors, decades ago. Their actions lend themselves to our uniquely Canadian brand of responsible government. In his important work, The Public Purse, which is used as source material in our most recent practice and procedure manual, Norman Ward describes the struggle of our nascent pre-Confederation legislatures, as it related to oversight, thus: In principle, therefore, the first goal usually sought by an assembly was to make the executive at least partially dependent on the assembly for its income; the second was to make it wholly so; the third, and most sophisticated, was to insist on some sort of detailed public accounting, on a systematic basis, of expenditures after they were made. In 1838, Lord Durham was sent by the mother of parliaments to investigate the cause of the previous year's rebellions in Upper and Lower Canada. One of the litany of causes was, as he describes, related to the relationships between the assemblies and the executives. In his hugely influential report, Lord Durham wrote: The Assembly, after it had obtained entire control over the public revenues, still found itself deprived of all voice in the choice or even designation of the persons in whose administration of affairs it could feel confidence. He went on to state: It is difficult to conceive what could have been their theory or government who imagined, that in any colony of England a body invested with the name and character of a representative assembly could be deprived of any of those powers which, in the opinion of Englishmen, are inherent in a popular legislature. This speaks to two principles of parliamentary control of finances: first, that the executive should have no income that is not granted to it or otherwise sanctioned by Parliament; and second, that the executive should make no expenditures except those approved by Parliament, in ways approved by Parliament. I am not suggesting that this legislature does not possess the capacity to scrutinize. I know it does, but I believe in recent years we have not been wielding that authority properly and effectively, especially as it relates to Mr. Ward’s third point regarding what ultimately became our main estimates. As a result, Canadians are now paying the price. We need only look at this very budget document for proof positive of what rushed legislation does, most particularly in the case of budgets. Hidden away in annex 3 of the budget, the fourth from last page reads as follows: In Budget 2022, the government proposes to amend the Old Age Security Act to clarify that the one-time payment made in August 2021 to seniors age 75 and older will be exempted from the income test for the Guaranteed Income Supplement and Allowances. This amendment corrects a reference error resulting from the passage of the Budget Implementation Act, 2021, No. 1. This begs the question: What was the error? In sections 266 and 268 of the Budget Implementation Act, 2021, the section that had intended to make the one-time, $500 payment to struggling seniors aged 75 and up non-taxable, the Liberals quoted the wrong section of the act. Instead of quoting section 275, the section that actually created the payment, they cited section 276, which is completely unrelated to seniors and instead deals with the Public Service Employment Act. As a result, right now, under law, as desperate seniors are filing their taxes, that $500 is considered income, and not just at tax time but come the July recalculation period for benefits. In other words, the government has created and legislated yet another potential benefit clawback. It is only prudent to highlight that last time, the budget was time allocated, meaning that the government, with the NDP's support, limited the amount of debate that we could have on the budget. That was debate where we might have found this error and saved seniors the stress of another possible clawback. I would note that it was the same group of seniors, those aged 75 plus, who had the wrong T4 information sent to them due to a misprint. How convenient that the same, exact group of people who were subject to an age-restricted benefit that everyone, including, I imagine, the CRA and the ESDC, thought was non-taxable, received misprinted T4s. Now we find out that the benefit is, under word of law, actually taxable. That is why my colleague for Miramichi—Grand Lake and I called on this government to extend the filing date for seniors. With regard to seniors, they have very little to celebrate in this year's budget. Of a projected $56.6 billion in new spending through to 2027, a paltry $20 million has been earmarked for supporting our seniors. To put that into perspective, that is 0.04% of spending announced in the next five years. There is nothing to help struggling formal and informal caregivers, nothing to help long-term care facilities and nothing to help alleviate the increasing cost of living they all face. Low-income seniors need help today, and they cannot afford to wait. To get back to my original point, our job here is to scrutinize. What we do here is the basis for responsible government. When we cannot do our jobs, Canadians suffer. On my file alone, we have seen it with the GIS clawback, we have seen it with the T4 delays, and now we are seeing it with the one-time payment, which are all things that could have been avoided if we actually took the time to do our job right. I will give credit to the hon. Minister of Seniors, who has acted on things when they were brought to her attention, but the point is that it should never have gotten to this point. Lastly, I want to touch on the absolute absurdity that is our main estimates process in relation to the budgetary process and the need to align Treasury Board with Finance in the preparation of those documents. However, my time is running short, so I will leave members with one more recent quote from the 2019 report of the Standing Committee on Government Operations and Estimates, entitled, “Improving Transparency and Parliamentary Oversight of the Government’s Spending Plans”. The report quotes Scott Brison as saying, “The ability to exercise oversight over government spending is the most important role that...parliamentarians can play in representing Canadians.” I urge everyone here to heed the words of our former Liberal president of the Treasury Board and let parliamentarians do our jobs thoroughly and effectively, because Canadians cannot afford for us to do otherwise.

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Mr. Kevin Lamoureux (Parliamentary Secretary to the Leader of the Government in the House of Commons, Lib.)

Apr/26/22 12:02:55 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, originally I thought I would ask a question in regard to seniors, but I am going to pass on that. The changes have, in fact, been made, in good part, and the budget finalizes that. We have been very supportive of our seniors over the years, from day one. My question, more specifically, is in regard to the member's historic perspective in terms of accountability of the House. One of the things, I would argue, being a parliamentarian for 30 years, in terms of the importance of getting that accountability and transparency, is looking at our rules. It is the Standing Orders. It is the way in which we process our daily proceedings. For example, if we were to, heaven forbid, look at the modernization of our House and our rules, and many of the concerns that the member opposite recognizes as something that is important, which I personally believe too, would she not agree that it is time that the House of Commons look at modernizing our rules to ensure that we can have ongoing transparency and accountability no matter who is in government?

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Mrs. Shelby Kramp-Neuman

Apr/26/22 12:04:09 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, I will start by suggesting that respect for this place, respect for my colleagues of all stripes, is incumbent on all of us to recognize. Due process, evaluation and critique of certain bills and passages are critical. In my opinion, it is the scrutiny of the public expenditures that is the core, and it is our Parliament's obligation. It is who we are as individuals and it is who we are as parliamentarians, and we can never give up that responsibility, especially in a confidence and supply arrangement.

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Ms. Andréanne Larouche (Shefford, BQ)

Apr/26/22 12:04:57 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, I thank my colleague. We share files pertaining to the status of women and seniors, and we often have the opportunity to talk. Naturally, she spoke about seniors. We sometimes forget that old age security puts money back into seniors’ pockets and contributes to their purchasing power. Seniors have become significantly poorer, and were impoverished even before the pandemic. The issue of health is just as crucial in our efforts to help seniors. My colleague accurately listed seniors’ needs and the importance of increasing health transfers to 35%, as Quebec and the provinces are calling for. That is essential; it is crucial. That is what seniors are asking for. Health is not just a matter of jurisdiction. Quebec and the provinces have the expertise to care for their seniors, but they need the financial means. It is important to hammer this message home. Does her party commit to supporting the request to increase health transfers to 35% in a recurrent and predictable manner?

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Mrs. Shelby Kramp-Neuman

Apr/26/22 12:06:03 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, we have to recognize that when seniors get to that stage in their life, whether it be in their own home to age in place, in a long-term care facility or in the homes of their children, they will be living the rest of their lives there. It is their space. It is their social circle and their recreational circle. When it comes to seniors, it seems like the current government has a habit of taking one step forward and two steps back. I am delighted with the record that the Conservative government has with regard to seniors. I think it is really important and prudent of us, as parliamentarians, to have their backs, in the words of the Liberal government. If they are going to have the backs of seniors, they need to step up and act.

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Mr. Peter Julian (New Westminster—Burnaby, NDP)

Apr/26/22 12:07:04 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, I always enjoy hearing my colleague in the House of Commons. Certainly, I thank her and her family for their service to Canadians. I have two questions. First of all, during the Harper government years, that dismal decade, the PBO evaluates that over $25 billion a year in tax monies went to overseas tax havens. That is a quarter of a trillion dollars. Will she acknowledge the contribution of the Harper government to our national debt through the signing of many offshore special tax agreements that allowed the ultrarich to take their money offshore? Second, in terms of dental care for seniors, there are over 29,000 people in Hastings—Lennox and Addington who would benefit from the NDP's dental plan. Many seniors will benefit from it. Will she acknowledge that dental care is important for seniors, and all Canadians, and that this will make a difference in their quality of life?

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Mrs. Shelby Kramp-Neuman

Apr/26/22 12:08:06 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, I thank the hon. member for the acknowledgement of my family's career. My father had a lovely retirement gathering last week and it was wonderful. With regard to the question he asked, I believe that my colleague has failed to mentioned the positive record of the Stephen Harper government and the results that he did deliver for seniors. More specifically to pharmacare and dental care, I think the devil is in the details. I would love to be proven wrong, but I am not—

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The Assistant Deputy Speaker (Mrs. Alexandra Mendès)

Apr/26/22 12:08:39 p.m.
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Resuming debate, the hon. member for Humber River—Black Creek.

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Hon. Judy A. Sgro (Humber River—Black Creek, Lib.)

Apr/26/22 12:08:45 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, I am pleased to see you in the chair and pleased to be back in the House. I hope everybody had a restful period of time and we are all back here now. As I rise in the House today to speak to this year’s budget, I will be sharing my time with the member for Mississauga—Streetsville, a wonderful new member of Parliament we have here who is doing great things and who is great to work with. Several weeks ago, when it was announced that our Liberal government had made a supply agreement deal with the New Democratic Party, I was concerned about that, and I made that known. I am a firm believer in helping and supporting not just Canadians, but those all over the world as we continue, but I am also, like many of my colleagues, a very strong believer in fiscal responsibility. With our country still in an unknown due to COVID, a war on Ukraine, and any other potential things that could come our way, I was unsettled about how we could meet those needs and still remain financially responsible as a government. I have to congratulate my hon. colleague, the Minister of Finance, as I no longer have those concerns because she struck the perfect chord in this budget. My concerns about the arrangements that we had made on the supply deal and the impact it was going to have on the direction of our government were very much unfounded, because we were able to produce a budget that, yes, delivered on things that mattered to other people but, importantly, we were fiscally responsible, and I was very pleased with all of that. Before I speak further on the budget, I want to mention page 101, which says “Protecting Our Freshwater”. It might sound like an odd thing to be concerned about as a Toronto member, but we have to be concerned about our lakes. It is an ongoing subject that I have been involved with for some time when it comes to the invasion of sea lamprey in our lakes and the agreements that we had between Canada and the U.S. We were not paying our share to ensure that the invasive sea lamprey were not allowed to continue to cause the kind of damage that they do in the Great Lakes. I have been lobbying on that issue with my former staff member Greg McClinchey and others. With the help of the member for Niagara Centre and his continued persistence, it is in the budget, with significant funds that will truly be our support in dealing with invasive species like that. I want to congratulate Mr. McClinchey and the member for Niagara Centre for pushing it over the line. I am glad it is done. It does not matter who gets the credit if it gets done, and it is going to make a difference in the Great Lakes and our cities. The other issue that matters a lot to the residents of Humber River—Black Creek is that all of the provinces have finally signed an agreement for affordable day care, something with which I go back to the previous prime minister Martin, trying to get child care then. That was at least 12 years ago. Well, we finally got it over the finish line and we have agreements with all of the provinces and the territories for an early learning and child care infrastructure fund in the budget. It is going to make a huge difference in the lives of residents in Humber River—Black Creek. Many of the parents in Ontario will be able to save an average of $6,000 per year per child by the end of 2022. What I see as most important for the residents of Humber River—Black Creek is the fact that many of the families have had to have one member of the partnership stay home, and I know that these women, many of them, wanted the opportunity to go to work. They could not find child care that was affordable. Well, now they will have child care that is affordable. They will be able to go back to school. They will be able to pursue a career. It will make a huge difference in their lives. Otherwise, they had to wait until their children were significantly grown up in order to be able to actually get on to work. When we look at seniors in poverty, which is an issue we have talked a lot about over the many years I have been here, every year we manage to reduce the number of seniors in poverty. However, if we turn around and make sure, and this is what we are doing with child care, that we provide women and men the opportunity to work, because their children are going to be in a safe day care, an affordable day care opportunity, they can go to work and contribute to their pensions from early on, not having to wait until their children are completely grown up and out of the house before they can go to work. The cost of child care has been exorbitant and parents were simply having to make a choice. They could earn money, but they would pay it all out in child care, so it just did not make any sense for them to go forward. The more Canadians are working, the better our economy will be. Since our government took power in 2015, we have brought forward six other budgets. Many of them have included great things that have helped the residents of Humber River—Black Creek, such as the Canada child benefit. We should not forget all the families that are benefiting throughout this country. We have helped 435,000 families out of poverty since 2015 and continue to provide almost $7,000 per child to families this year. We are increasing the minimum wage. We have also increased the amounts for the GIS and the old age security pension, things that matter to many people. We have made investments in workers. As a result of the pandemic, we realized just how important it is to have paid sick days. We can keep our head in the sand all we want, but the reality is that if people are sick and have to pay rent and put food on the table, they are going to go to work, sick or not, and that is very unfortunate. Having 10 paid days of sick leave for federal and private sector employees will make a difference in the lives of many Canadians as we move forward. We are increasing climate action incentive payments. Most families in my riding are going to receive over $800. I am certainly talking to them about paying attention to how they file their income tax, because there is almost $800 coming back as a result of the carbon tax that they continue to hear people criticize. It is putting money back into the pockets of many people. I talk a lot about how important it is to use a budget to be fiscally responsible, but also to give people a hand up as we move forward, and dental health is one that we as a party and certainly I have talked about many times. I talk to people in my riding who are having a tough time and cannot get a job. They have missing teeth, and even when they try to pull themselves together to present themselves for a job, clearly they do not present themselves well because they do not have the money to have proper dental health care. We, as Liberals, have talked about it, and I think this agreement we have is a major boost. Yes, it is going to cost a lot of money, but if it makes people's mental health and physical health better as a result of having proper dental care, I think it makes a huge difference. We are phasing it in, again, in a fiscally responsible way. I think those things are very important as we move forward. On housing, I cannot tell members how happy I am to see the amount of money going into housing, and how well we are doing with that. It is a huge subject. If people do not have a place to live or a roof over their head, it does not matter what else we do for them; that is what they need, so investing in affordable housing and making it all move forward is an extremely important thing. I am thrilled to see the amount of money that is going into housing. Co-op housing in particular is something that I have a real interest in. I would like to see a lot more of that built throughout the country, especially in Humber River—Black Creek, for the residents there. Madam Speaker, I can see that my time is up. Thank you very much for the opportunity. I think it is a great budget, and I am very proud to stand and support it.

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Mr. Martin Champoux (Drummond, BQ)

Apr/26/22 12:18:20 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, following the NDP-Liberal agreement and alliance and the announcements made about pharmacare and dental care, there is something missing in the budget, namely a recurrent and unconditional increase in health transfers. This an important, basic and unanimous request by Quebec and the provinces, to which the government is responding only in a roundabout fashion. That is not what this government is doing with its noble proposals. In fact, no one is opposed to dental care or pharmacare. However, there are things that are the exclusive purview of the provinces and that could have been managed by Quebec and the provinces according to their respective priorities. Does my colleague not think that it would have been better for all the provinces and Quebec to simply meet their request and transfer the money to the provinces so that they can pay for and manage these programs themselves? As we have been asking for a long time, and as the Bloc Québécois is repeating yet again, would it not have been better to increase health transfers on a recurrent basis so that we can properly manage our health care systems?

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Hon. Judy A. Sgro

Apr/26/22 12:19:46 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, I do not want to be too blunt about it, but the reality is that the federal government passes millions and millions of dollars down to the provinces for health care and so on, but the provinces' priorities are not always the same priorities that we at the federal level maybe think they should be. On the issue of dental care, many of the provinces probably would have never got around to doing it because it is all about decisions. I am glad that we are supporting something this important. We were headed in that direction, and I suspect in the next election we would have been covering off dental care, but we were able to move forward sooner and it is that much better.

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