44th Parl. 1st Sess.
June 6, 2022 11:00AM
Madam Speaker, the member is perhaps one of the most experienced in the entire Parliament, which is surprising given her relative youth. Given that experience, would she agree with me that often times it is in lengthy debates that legislation gets improved, that we find issues and make laws better for Canadians.
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Madam Speaker, I rise today on a serious and sober note. I am here to ring the alarm bells. Our future prosperity is at risk. I am expressing this concern not out of some sense of blind partisanship but rather out of a sense of duty to my country, which I love, but which I also fear for.
As has been said by the Prime Minister, the finance minister, the associate finance minister, many members across the aisle and experts across our country, one of the keys to our national prosperity is economic growth.
Economic growth allows parents to pay for their children's education. It allows teenagers to get their first job and buy their first car. It allows single mothers the opportunity to not have three or four jobs but one. It allows workers the opportunity at a promotion. It allows young people to buy a house for the first time. It allows employers to create jobs. It allows hard-working families to pay off their ever-mounting credit card bills.
In short, many of the conditions for the pursuit of happiness are preceded by economic growth. Economic growth gives Canadians hope. In contrast, the economy we are currently experiencing, which may very well go to a seventies-style stagflation, is of lower wages and fewer economic opportunities for families and individuals. It creates mental health issues across our country as people struggle with the financial consequences of declining economic growth. It sows the seeds of division in our society, so instead of uniting, we are dividing, as we have seen from our Prime Minister.
For all of these and many other reasons, it is indisputable that economic growth is absolutely critical to Canada's future. However, I am ringing those proverbial alarm bells because Canada is poised for slow, if not zero, economic growth for many months or even years to come.
Sadly, the reasons are starting to become structural within our economy. One of the key drivers is a struggle to be competitive and a leader in economic productivity. Canada is falling behind the rest of the world. We are increasingly less productive than many of our peers in the G7 and the G20.
We are also struggling with innovation. Although we have brilliant people from coast to coast to coast, we are failing to bring new innovation and products to market. We are struggling as a country to be a leading innovator in the world.
The last issue I will discuss is a little more subjective. We are facing a declining morale and an increasing mental health crisis. We are not seeing a winning attitude going forward, which all starts at the top with the federal leadership of this country.
Let us explore these areas one by one. Productivity has been an issue, unfortunately, that has dogged the Canadian economy for decades. However, the problem has become particularly acute over the last few years. One of the ways economists measure the productivity of a country is in the amount of contribution per worker per hour. Canada is among the lowest in the OECD countries. We are at $50 per hour per worker. When we contrast that to those of the United States, Switzerland and Ireland, they are all considerably above that number.
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Mr. Speaker, bentornato. Welcome back. It is great to have you back in the chair.
When I left off, I was talking about a challenge that faces our Canadian economy and really puts all of our prosperity at risk, and that is our failure to be a leader in productivity across the world. That noted right-wing commentator, Bill Morneau, actually commented that we are, as he correctly points out, number 25 out of 36 countries in the OECD when it comes to productivity.
That might not mean a lot to Canadians sitting at home or that Canadian who is sitting at home watching CPAC today, but productivity has a tremendous impact on our lives. When we are less productive, that means with every stroke of a pen, we get paid less. That means with every swing of the hammer, we get paid less. With every wire that we fix and with every brick that we lay, Canadians are getting paid less because we are failing on the productivity network. It means there is less opportunity for our children, that there are fewer promotions, and that there are less opportunities for our businesses and many more failures.
While Canada is less productive than many of the G7 and G20 nations, like many other countries, and, in fact, probably more so, we have well-educated and motivated citizens that are ready and willing to work and to lead the world in productivity. The one differentiating factor that Canada has that is separating us from many other G7 countries is our government. Our government has extremely high rates of taxation and regulation that are limiting our ability to be competitive. We are failing as a country to lead the world in productivity because of a self-inflicted wound of excess government, excess taxation and excess regulation.
As we switch from productivity now to innovation, this is another challenge. We are currently sixth out of the G7 in innovation. Once again, we have an amazing populace, are blessed with many natural resources and have a great education system, but we are continuing to fail when it comes to innovation. We have a growing innovation culture out there, including many incubators, such as Venture13 in my own riding, which is doing a terrific job, but we have a challenge.
Once again, it goes back to the government. Our system of legislation and taxation is antiquated, uncompetitive and fails to promote innovation. Our legislative framework fails to protect and to promote the commercialization of intellectual property. Our taxation system fails to reward those who are taking risks with regard to innovation. Other countries around the world are renewing their innovation frameworks, because they know that the first to innovate will be the first to win in the global economy of the 21st century. Unfortunately, Canada is failing to keep pace.
The next area is admittedly more subjective. The human spirit is perhaps the most indomitable force in the universe. My father used to say to me, “If you believe you can, you are right, and if you believe you can't, you are also right.” This is a country that built a railroad across mountains, over and past waterways in the 1800s, an engineering feat that would be impressive today, a feat of political will that would be impressive today, but for a new country starting out in the world, it was almost unthinkable.
We as a country need to focus again on accomplishing great things. We need to not be afraid to win but to be bold and brave and to go after that victory. We need to celebrate those who are winning, because when we undermine those achievers, we are undermining those who very much underpin our communities, our societies and our economies. We must celebrate our job creators, our successful business owners and, indeed, our innovators. As I said, when we demonize our achievers, we undermine those individuals and institutions who are the drivers of our shared prosperity.
While it is incredibly important to be equitable and to make sure there is a fair distribution of a society's wealth, we must not also lose sight of the fact that when we expand the pie, we help everyone, but when that pie shrinks, it is often the most vulnerable who suffer the most. We are a nation capable of great deeds. I believe that the 21st century can belong to Canada.
Our job as the official opposition is not just to criticize, so because time is brief, I will go through three quick proposals that could radically improve our country. First is a complete comprehensive review of the Income Tax Act. Second is a national economic development plan. Third is the construction of an energy corridor.
If we are able to harness all of the great individual wisdom and abilities in our country, there is no doubt we will have a successful next 100 years.
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Madam Speaker, that is the difference between the Liberals and the Conservatives. The Liberals measure success by the amount of money spent. The Conservatives measure it in results.
Clearly, we are losing when it comes to innovation and productivity. An expensive failure is still a failure.
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Madam Speaker, I want to say a quick word of thanks to all of the interpreters. They are doing an amazing job. I understand that CBC had a story about their contributions to the workplace, and I thank them for all that they do. They are doing great, but I did not quite catch all of that. However, I think I understood the basics of it.
We need to empower our provinces to be ambitious as the Liberal government continues to attempt to take more power and control from them. We need to empower our provinces, Quebec included, to be the best they can possibly be.
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Madam Speaker, this is part of what I am talking about when I say we need a national economic development plan. Part of that will be more traditionally Conservative ideas, such as reducing regulation and taxation, but part of it is also more traditionally the space of the NDP, I might say, which is funding the areas of education that are in demand. Right now we have a disconnect between the education system and what the private sector needs. We need to bring that together, so I would agree.
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Madam Speaker, I enjoyed serving with the hon. member for Stormont—Dundas—South Glengarry.
I agree with what the Auditor General said. In my year and a half at the public accounts committee, I became increasingly frustrated that government departments, and indeed the Liberal government, were measuring success not on the results they achieved but on the money they spent. To repeat, an expensive failure is still a failure.
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