44th Parl. 1st Sess.
November 18, 2022 10:00AM
Madam Speaker, my hon. colleague talked about programs to assist university students getting into their careers. University students I speak to in my riding are very concerned about the evaporating dream of home ownership. I know the member will probably mention the first home savings account, which would allow them to save up to $40,000. I will point out that, at the rate of inflation, this is about one year's worth of inflation on housing.
What will the government do to tackle inflation, which is the real problem students are facing?
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Madam Speaker, I appreciate that housing is a critical feature. It is a critical feature in the province of British Columbia, as it is in my province of Ontario. What we are doing, as I mentioned, are things such as the first-time home buyers' tax credit and the tax-free first home savings account. We have already initiated a national housing strategy. We campaigned in the 2020 election on more housing starts, and we are working co-operatively with many provinces, including my own, to build more housing. I also point to the rapid housing initiative, which has been very targeted in building more housing faster.
In terms of inflation, I hope every member of the chamber appreciates the inflationary pressures Canada is facing are not unique to Canada alone. They are being faced by all of our G7 allies, indeed by all of our allies around the planet. In fact, comparatively, Canada's rate of inflation is lower than the United States and all of our G7 allies, which is an important feature for this debate.
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Madam Speaker, I thank the parliamentary secretary for his speech. He just went over the whole inflation problem.
The word “inflation” appears in the fall economic update 108 times. We know that in contrast to the previous budget, there are no new measures. It is just a rehash. It uses different rhetoric to justify the same measures.
The government is rightly concerned that a recession could hit this winter. As far as the recession is concerned, the Bloc Québécois is asking for employment insurance to be reformed as soon as possible so it is ready to go. The government was supposed to have it in place for last summer, but the system still has not been reformed. We would not want to have to create a CERB 2.0 to limit the damage and make up for a failing EI system.
Why was this reform not included in Bill C‑32?
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Madam Speaker, I thank the member for Joliette for his question and his interest in this very important issue.
Regarding inflation, I mentioned in my speech that all the programs, roughly six of them, are indexed to inflation. In other words, if inflation goes up, the government benefits will also go up.
As far as EI is concerned, that is a very specific issue. Members can see from the mandate letter that the Prime Minister wrote to the minister responsible for this file that we are here to resolve the situation in consultation with all the provinces. We will always be there for employers and workers.
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Madam Speaker, working with Unifor, the Alberta Federation of Labour and IBEW, we have been pushing the government to get some real standards in place to create a clean energy economy. We were pleased to see that we actually have some labour standards now, some labour obligations, for tax credits for new projects. That is significant.
However, we have not yet seen the commitment for an industrial strategy to really drive a clean energy economy. At what point will we see, from the government, the money on the table required to transform us from a fossil fuel economy and make the investments needed to gather up the huge opportunities waiting in the clean energy economy?
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Madam Speaker, I will point the member to a few different things.
One is the approach that we have taken with labour standards vis-à-vis our conclusion of agreements internationally. CUSMA comes to mind as a fair example. Second, it is not solely about investments that the Canadian government provides. It also about the tax credits we provide to spur innovation and investment. The clean tax credit is now available to entities that are pursuing clean tech and sustainable growth industries. That was revealed in the fall economic statement. I will also point him to the fact that our environmental package of the last seven years includes more than $100 billion in investments.
He mentioned the Alberta Federation of Labour. Its response to our share buyback taxation on banks was that it is “Very positive news to hear Finance Minister Freeland confirm earlier reports that Canada will tax stock buybacks”—
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- Nov/18/22 10:44:51 a.m.
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We have to resume debate. I will remind the hon. member that we do not mention the names of current members of the House.
Resuming debate, the hon. member for Kenora has the floor.
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Madam Speaker, I am honoured by the opportunity to rise again today and speak to a government bill, Bill C-32, in regard to the fall economic statement. The member for Winnipeg North believes it is a good bill. Unfortunately, I cannot really say the same, and I am going to get into that here with my remarks.
Obviously, it is an important discussion we are having today, with the cost of living crisis that is facing Canadians across the country. We are feeling that in the Kenora riding in northern Ontario, and we know we are seeing it across the country, but unfortunately, the government's economic statement is really just more of the same policies we have seen over the last number of years from the government. It is more of the same policies that have driven up inflation in the first place and have really created and exacerbated this cost of living crisis people are facing.
In the lead-up to the economic statement, Conservatives called for the same things we have been calling for for quite some time. It will probably not surprise members to know what we were calling for; we were calling for no new spending and no new taxes. We know the government's spending has driven up inflation. The PBO has told us that and independent economists have told us that, and that is the real cause and the reason we are here today and Canadians are facing the concerns they are.
Conservatives believe that every new dollar of spending should be matched by a dollar of savings. It is a very simple principle, something that most people would use in their own households and with their own pocketbooks, that if we are going to spend more money on one thing, we should find savings elsewhere. Unfortunately, that is not what we saw from the government, and it has brought forward a plan that is really just going to add more fuel to the inflationary fire.
Of course, the second thing we have called for, as I mentioned earlier, is no new taxes, because Canadians are really feeling the squeeze right now. The cost of everything is going up, and the government's additional taxes and the increases in the taxes, including the tripling of the carbon tax, are not going to make that any better. Canadians are looking for relief, and Conservatives are here fighting for that relief and calling on the government to do the same.
We know half of Canadians are $200 away from insolvency right now, and that is a very stark and striking statistic that shows the real issues and challenges people are facing. I want to share some concerns constituents have brought and sent to me. One comes from a constituent of mine in Pickle Lake, which is the northernmost municipality in Ontario and is in my riding. This constituent says, “Costs are rising at an alarming rate, and living in a remote community makes it even more so. With gas prices and the cost of heating fuel continually on the rise, it makes it hard to make ends meet.” That is just one of the many concerns in letters and emails I know I have been getting and I think all of us in the House have been getting from our own respective communities, highlighting how difficulty it is for people to get by.
Inflation is impacting gas, groceries and home heating, perhaps the most. These are three essential things that Canadians need. In fact, when it comes to gas prices, far too often in northwestern Ontario we see some of the highest gas prices in the country. I want to share a quick excerpt from a Kenora Online news article from September of this year. The headline is “Kenora has the most expensive gas in Ontario, again”.
This is something we see over and over again, that the Kenora district has the highest gas prices in the province of Ontario. Of course, being in a remote northern area, the issues of the added cost of the carbon tax hit us so much more than they would in areas like Toronto, Ottawa and across southern Ontario. This specific article notes that Kenora had the “14th most expensive fuel in Canada, behind [only] 13 communities from British Columbia”. I think that highlights, at the time of writing, just how challenging the fuel prices are.
Gas is essential in the Kenora district. People need it, not only to go to work or get groceries, but often to travel multiple hours to medical appointments. It is really something that is perhaps taken for granted for those in southern Ontario and in the larger urban centres, who have public transit and many more options and services close to home. People need to use fuel to travel long distances in the remote north, and that is something that definitely makes everything more complicated for people in the Kenora riding and across northern Ontario.
I also want to share a couple more letters that I received from constituents about that. Wendy from Red Lake reached out to say that the prices of gas, food and electricity are all making it difficult for seniors to remain in our area as well. Tina from Dryden is a single mother of three. She says that she is forced to work two jobs to support her children, and more often than not it has become easier to eat takeout, which of course is super unhealthy, so she is very concerned about that.
This all goes back to the taxes and the inflationary spending policies of the government. It is not just gas. As I mentioned, it is groceries and home heating that are getting hit as well.
When it comes to groceries, we are seeing record food bank usage across the country. It is at an all-time high. There have been 1.5 million visits in one month to food banks in Canada. I have heard a lot about that as well from constituents.
Another individual, from Sioux Lookout, reached out to me saying that the cost of food has become so unaffordable, especially the healthy, nutritious food that is essential for her children. She is very concerned about how that is going to be impacting her. I have had a couple from Minaki reach out, saying they are both pensioners on a fixed income. They are facing a choice between eating properly or being able to stay warm this winter. That is the crisis they are facing in the Kenora riding.
I just want to share one more, from a constituent who wrote in saying that if we look at the prices in Ear Falls, a carton of milk right now costs $8.39, and a single head of lettuce is $7.99. It has become almost impossible for people to afford to put food on the table, specifically healthy food.
With the coming winter months, with the colder weather, we know home heating is something a lot of people are very concerned about. It is not a luxury in northern Ontario. It is essential. Richard from Kenora has written to me to share that his natural gas has jumped from 11¢ a cubic metre to 30¢ a cubic metre, nearly tripling in price as a result of the government's policies. He is very concerned about how he is going to be able to afford to heat his home.
What is the answer? Luckily, a constituent wrote to me to tell me what the answer is. Faith from Kenora simply says, “Eric, the carbon tax needs to go.” I could not agree more. She is obviously feeling the squeeze as well.
The concern I have, and I know all of us on this side of the House have this concern, is that when the government is faced with this crisis, its only answer is to spend more money and continue with the same inflationary policies that have really gotten us into this mess in the first place. There is no question that the Liberals like to judge their results based on how much money they can spend. If we ask a question about anything in the House, they say they have spent all this money and they are doing a great job.
On this side of the House, we are looking at the results. When we have record food bank usage across the country, when people are struggling to put food on the table and when those in remote northern communities are struggling to get by, it is clear that these policies are not working.
We are simply asking the government to rethink its approach, to stop its inflationary spending and to look at cutting taxes on struggling Canadians who are looking only for relief. That is why, as I mentioned earlier, I will not be supporting the fall economic statement. That is why I am concerned with the economic direction of the government. I look forward to any questions and comments from my colleagues on that.
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Madam Speaker, the Conservatives tend to focus on correlation rather than causation, so they will say there is a Liberal government in Ottawa and there is global inflation, including bad inflation in England, and therefore it is the Liberal government's fault. However, that is not how economics works. We have to look at causation.
I would like to understand a bit more the member's logic about food inflation. Is it demand-caused inflation? People can only consume so much food, and food demand goes up with population growth. It is not a function of how much the government spent on infrastructure last month. Therefore, is it demand driven or is it supply-cost driven? The price on carbon did not triple; it went up by 2.2¢ per litre last April. I am just wondering how that 2.2¢ per-litre increase can be contributing to so much food inflation, which is running above 10%.
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Madam Speaker, that is another out-of-touch comment from the Liberal government. The Liberals simply seem to believe that prices are skyrocketing and they are just victims of it and have absolutely no responsibility here. The Parliamentary Budget Officer has indicated that it is the government's inflationary spending that is the cause of inflation. Future Liberal leader Mark Carney has said so, as have other leading economists across the country. There are certainly other challenges that we are facing, but there is no denying that when the government spends more, it adds to inflation, and when it taxes more, it makes things more expensive for Canadians. Why will the Liberals not understand that?
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Madam Speaker, we have listened to our Conservative friends talk about inflation and January's tax increase, but we cannot take their “triple, triple, triple” chant any more. We would like them to find something new to say. However, they are right that costs will triple and that that will have consequences for people. That much is true.
Let us talk about climate change. The current carbon tax rate is pretty much ineffective. We are the laughingstock of COP27. Canada is ranked 58th out of 60 countries. It is the only G7 country where emissions have increased since 2015, the year the Liberals came to power. We have to take action on climate change.
At COP27, we heard that if we do nothing, the cost to African nations in particular will be atrocious. If we do not pay now, we will pay even more later.
What is the solution, according to my Conservative friends?
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Madam Speaker, I would agree in many respects with my colleague from the Bloc, that the Liberal government has missed every single environmental target it has set. Canada is now at the bottom of the pack when it comes to climate change. The government has brought forward all these taxation policies that cause economic pain for Canadians, but we are not seeing any environmental gain as a result. Therefore, it is clear that the Liberal plan is not working and it is time for a new government that is going to work to make life more affordable for Canadians and bring forward a real plan to protect the environment. That is what we are going to do on this side of the House.
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Madam Speaker, I want to follow up on the question from the hon. member for Lac-Saint-Louis to the member for Kenora, because a really critical point is understanding that what we are experiencing now is not typical inflation. Real costs have really gone up.
I was recently talking to a farmer in Alberta who had real drought that meant that he could get a yield of only about half the barley he would normally get, but on balance the year was good because the war in Ukraine is so caught up in the cost of barley that the prices have soared, so half as much barley yielded more profit.
This is complicated stuff, and it is not about one thing only. It is a bit about demand-driven inflation, but it is a lot about supply-driven inflation, which means that the tools are not as easily described as government spending too much money. I wonder if the member has any thoughts on that.
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Madam Speaker, as I said in an earlier response to a Liberal member's question, there are many aspects that are impacting a lot of the challenges we are seeing here in the country, but there is no denying the fact that, as the PBO pointed out, as Mark Carney has pointed out and as many economists across the country have pointed out, when the government spends more it makes life more unaffordable for Canadians; it drives up inflation.
The member for Saanich—Gulf Islands says that this is very complicated, but it is not complicated for people in northern Ontario who are just struggling to put food on the table and to fill their gas tanks, and who are worried about heating their homes. They know the government's spending is driving it. They know they cannot afford any more tax hikes, and that is why they are looking for relief from the Liberals.
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- Nov/18/22 11:00:22 a.m.
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Madam Speaker, it is my pleasure to rise today, following Veterans' Week, to highlight the work veterans across my community of Ottawa Centre have been doing to commemorate and remember those lost serving our country at home and abroad.
I was honoured to begin this year's Veterans' Week by taking part in a community-led ceremony, organized by local veterans, at the Brantwood Place Gates in Old Ottawa East. This annual ceremony is cherished by residents, and it was heartwarming to see it back after two years.
In addition, I had the opportunity to visit the Montgomery Legion on Kent Street in Centretown and the Westboro Legion on Richmond Road, where I saw first-hand the dedicated service shown by so many veterans and legion volunteers to keep the memory of our fallen soldiers alive. The work of our local legions is truly indispensable, and I would like to take this opportunity to thank everyone for supporting them in our community and those they serve, while we remember our veterans for the sacrifices they made for our country.
Lest we forget.
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- Nov/18/22 11:01:25 a.m.
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Madam Speaker, I cannot see why.
Millions of Canadians suffer from age-related macular degeneration, or AMD. This presently incurable disease starts with a loss of visual acuity in the centre of the eye. Eventually, the condition almost always results in blindness.
Many of our constituents and even members of our own families are affected, but now there are emerging treatment options. For instance, a new non-invasive device from a Canadian company has been clinically tested in Canada, and it offered positive results to all who were actively treated. It is less expensive than the present course of treatment, which only slows AMD's progression. There are other innovations on the horizon as well.
Unfortunately, Health Canada has been studying and delaying the approval of this life-changing treatment for almost two years. I am not questioning the thoroughness or importance of Health Canada's work. However, I am saying that procrastination and delays are not acceptable when our loved ones are going blind.
I cannot see why.
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- Nov/18/22 11:02:31 a.m.
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Madam Speaker, the relationship between Canada and Poland has never been stronger. This week, under the auspices of the ambassador of Poland, our Polish Canadian community gathered to celebrate the 80th anniversary of diplomatic relations between our two countries.
I was also proud to join the Canada-Poland Parliamentary Friendship Group in hosting the Polish Secretary of State and his delegation from Poland. We talked about our unwavering solidarity in defence of Ukraine, highlighted by Canada's most recent commitment to send 40 combat engineers to Poland to lead the training of Ukrainian soldiers. We also talked about the critical role Canada can play to help Poland become energy independent, transitioning away from coal to nuclear power through Canadian small modular nuclear reactors.
Poland and Canada have been examples to the world of the power of solidarity. May that friendship continue to grow and prosper.
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- Nov/18/22 11:03:30 a.m.
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Madam Speaker, today I stand to mark Transgender Day of Remembrance, and I call attention to the 375 trans and gender-diverse people murdered last year, and the nearly 4,000 people killed over the past decade worldwide just for being themselves. These numbers are a glimpse of the harassment, discrimination, violence and undocumented deaths of transgendered people happening worldwide.
Despite this, I am profoundly moved by the strength of so many transgendered people. On this day, I am thinking fondly of an amazing transgendered woman named Melanie. Melanie describes her experience to me before transitioning as being full of struggles to get through each day in a body that was not her own. After transitioning later in life, Melanie is now happily remarried and living as her true self.
Today I call on members of the House to unite in showing transgendered people, with action, that they are not alone and deserve safety, dignity and respect.
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- Nov/18/22 11:04:36 a.m.
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Madam Speaker, last Sunday I had the honour of doing the official kickoff at the Quebec Major Junior Football League championship game between the South Shore Junior Packers and the Ottawa Junior Riders in my hometown of Greenfield Park. With my green and gold cap on, I joined our community in proudly cheering on the Packers as they went on to win the game 37 to 15 and bring home the coveted Joe Pistilli Cup.
The Greenfield Park Packers Football Association, which supports tykes to junior teams, is no stranger to championship wins. Over the years, it has won several provincial cups, and many of its past players have gone on to play professional ball.
This non-profit, volunteer-run association offers youth in our community a unique experience where they learn teamwork and respect for others.
Congratulations to the QMJFL organizers, with a special shout-out to Elizabeth and Steve Britton, and to the Packers organization and players for doing Greenfield Park and all of the South Shore proud.
We the park.
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- Nov/18/22 11:05:42 a.m.
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Madam Speaker, when the Taliban seized power last year, about 13,000 Afghans fled north to Tajikistan. Some of these refugees had rendered service to the Canadian Armed Forces earlier during the war. For several months now, the Tajik government has been openly contemplating deporting all Afghan refugees back to Afghanistan. For those who helped foreign troops during the war, this would be a death sentence.
One such family belongs to a courageous interpreter who now resides in my riding in the town of Smiths Falls. His parents and siblings, one of whom is only 15 years old, are languishing in Tajikistan. The family clearly qualifies to come to Canada and had filled out all necessary paperwork back in January, but as of this month, my office has learned that the department has not even started verifying security checks.
This is just one of literally thousands of examples of how the glacial pace of Canada's immigration bureaucracy is risking lives. Surely this country can do better for those who helped us in our time of need now that they are in need of our help.
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