44th Parl. 1st Sess.
October 17, 2023 10:00AM
- Oct/17/23 10:28:33 a.m.
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Mr. Speaker, it is an absolute honour to rise in the House today, and it is somewhat intimidating to follow the hon. member for Carleton, the leader of His Majesty's loyal opposition.
We heard a very compelling case for supporting this motion. The fact is that Canadians are hurting from coast to coast to coast. They are feeling the effects of the soaring cost of living, the ever-increasing cost at the fuel pumps, the ever-increasing heating costs and the soaring costs of having a place to live. That may be the mortgage rates, which have doubled over the last eight years, the rent doubling, seeing interest rates going up or seeing the dream of home ownership quickly falling away for so many of our young people.
It is something that all of us in this House see if we take the time to visit the communities we represent; I am sure many do. In my travels and in the conversations I have experienced recently, I have heard from Canadians back home in western New Brunswick. In recent visits, I engaged with people on the beautiful Island of Prince Edward; I heard it there as well. Throughout Atlantic Canada, Canadians are hurting. They are experiencing the pain of this ever-expansive cost of living that challenges them even when they go to get necessary supplies at the grocery store.
Perhaps some of the most heartbreaking stories I have heard have come from seniors. They have worked hard all their lives. They were counting on the pensions they have and what they paid in to be able to carry them through. However, they are honestly and sincerely worried about what they set aside and what they worked hard to save up. Will it be enough to sustain them as things continue to rise in cost?
Some seniors, especially in Atlantic Canada, have had to make tough decisions. They are facing another long winter, wondering if they have enough left over to pay their heat bill and make sure they have adequate groceries, let alone put a little fuel in their gas tanks. These challenges are very real. When we take the time to hear seniors' stories, we cannot help but be affected.
It is our job as their representatives in this House, which is the people's House, to bring those concerns here. Our job, as His Majesty's loyal opposition, is to make sure that the Liberals are held to account, that they are responsible in the legislation they bring forward and that this legislation has a positive impact on the lives of the people we all represent.
I believe that it behooves this House and that it would be the responsible thing for the government, and this entire House, to move and bring forward motions and legislation representing the concerns that we are hearing right now. The top-of-mind concern for Canadians from across this country, bar none, is the soaring cost of living and inflation. I am hearing it everywhere I go.
I believe it would be good for us to all consider what is happening right now to cause Canadians this kind of angst and concern. What is leading to the increased levels of anxiety and despair we are seeing? There are desperate situations happening not only in our inner cities but also in our rural communities. What is causing this?
After eight years, we have seen things that have led to the current circumstance we are in. There has been a multiplicity of factors. One of them that cannot be discounted is the fact that the Prime Minister has added more national debt than all other previous prime ministers combined. That is a staggering fact.
When we double the debt in under eight years, we are doing something that will have devastating consequences in the long term. I am talking not about the deficit but about the debt of this country. We have half a trillion dollars of inflationary deficits that have led directly to inflation rates that are at a 40-year high.
We saw that, prior to the budget in 2023, even our own Minister of Finance said that what Canadians want right now is for inflation to come down and interest rates to fall. That was one of the primary goals of this year's budget. It was not to pour more fuel on the fire and then proceed to usher in $60 billion in new spending. The government did not hear what was being said, or if it did, it is certainly applying the wrong fix to the problem. We cannot stop inflation and soaring interest rates by spending increasing amounts of money. That is adding fuel to the fire. As has been previously stated, the former Liberal finance minister John Manley said that we cannot keep doing that and expect to be successful.
We have seen this all throughout history, any time governments have gone down this road. In order to increase the revenues to pay for their ever-expanding debt and deficits, they inevitably increase taxes. If we ask the citizens of this country if they can afford more tax; I think the answer would be a resounding no. They have more bills than they have paycheques. When they get to the end of their paycheques and all they have is another bill waiting, then the government suggests that it is going to quadruple the carbon tax, because it will make them feel better and somehow cause the weather to change and the climate to improve.
A short time ago, when we asked the environment commissioner at the natural resources committee if there is yet in place in Canada a metric that can tell us how much the carbon tax has reduced the amount of carbon in Canada's atmosphere, he responded by saying that there is no such metric in place as of yet. The carbon tax is one of the major factors of inflation in this country. Therefore, the landmark signature piece of environmental legislation that has led to huge inflation in this country does not even have a metric by which we can tell Canadians its impact on the overall environment of Canada. That is a disgrace, and it is impossible to justify to the Canadian population. At a time of economic duress, when people are feeling the heat economically and their finances are depleting, we as a government are going to tell them yet again that we are going to keep augmenting the carbon tax. However, we really cannot tell them why, because we cannot demonstrate its effect on the environment. That is unjustifiable.
It is time for a course correction. It is time for the government to rearrange its priorities and get back to what it needs to be doing, which is to develop the incredible potential that Canada has. If we want to tackle the inflationary problem that we have in this country, let us get our economy growing and our people working. Let us get off their backs and start removing the hindrances to their prosperity and growth.
Do members know what the definition of “frustration” is? It is impeding progress, feeling that we have all this potential we cannot touch and that we can never attain what we want, because of the weight that is currently on our backs. That is why there is an increasing sense of frustration among Canadians; they are crying out for change. They want the government to get out of the way, stand by their side, say it will unleash their potential and let them do what they do best. That is to grow, develop, work, make money and, yes, make a profit so that they can better their future and the lives of their children and families.
I hope the government will do the right thing and support our motion today.
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- Oct/17/23 12:28:14 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, I want to start by congratulating my good friend, the passionate member for King—Vaughan for her incredible speech. She is a great advocate for her community,
Canadians are going through housing hell right now. Nine out of 10 young people say they have lost the dream of home ownership. Newcomers will not be able to achieve home ownership. The IMF is now saying that Canada is the most at risk in the G7 for a mortgage default crisis. There is a major housing crisis in this country, which we need to take seriously before people start losing their homes.
We need to understand how we got here in the first place. The Liberal-NDP government spent more money than all governments before it combined. Let me put this into context. Between 2015 and 2023, the Liberal-NDP government spent more money than every single government did from 1867 to 2015, combined. That has led to 40-year highs in inflation, which has led to the most rapid mortgage interest rate hikes we have seen in the last three decades.
The Bank of Canada had to counter with something, and it did so with the interest rate hikes. That was done in reaction to something, and that something was the government deficit. It is not just Conservatives who admit that government deficits fuelled inflation, making interest rates go up. Random Liberals and others have said the same thing.
I will point to the three Ms: Manley, Macklem and Morneau. They have all admitted that government spending fuels inflation. Mark Carney, who could possibly be the next Liberal leader, also said that inflation was due to domestic pressures. It was nothing to do with outside pressures, as the Liberals and NDP try to make everyone believe. They say that it is always someone else's problem and never theirs. Even someone who could become a Liberal leader admits that the inflation we see today is due to domestic pressures.
Even the current finance minister has admitted this. Though she does not believe in it, she still admitted that government deficits do fuel inflation. It is too bad that, after she said she wanted to be careful to not fuel the inflationary fire, she dumped a $63-billion jerry can of fuel on that inflationary fire. What ended up happening? Inflation went up and so did mortgage interest rates. Once again, this is why Canada is now the most at-risk country in the G7 for a mortgage default crisis.
The Liberal-NDP government shows its incompetence over and over again. These are the geniuses who ended up spending $89 billion, almost $90 billion, on housing only to have housing costs double in this country. Mortgages have doubled. Rents have doubled. Let us look into that a bit deeper.
Why have mortgages doubled in this country? As I identified, it was a domino effect. All the money printing the government did was bounced off by bonds. What ended up happening? We flooded the market in doing that, and there was too much money chasing too few goods, which is literally the definition of inflation.
When inflation went up due to all the government deficits, the Bank of Canada had to do the opposite of what the government is doing. Former Liberal finance minister, John Manley, put it perfectly. He said that today's situation is much like the Liberal-NDP government deficit. It is like it is pressing the gas, the inflationary gas, while the Bank of Canada is slamming on the breaks as hard as it can with its interest rate hikes. Both things are happening at one time. They are working in opposite directions and the engine is going to blow.
Who will be left paying for this mess? Canadian taxpayers will be. There is only one party in the House that cares about taxpayers' money and wants to make sure that Canadians do not lose their homes. That is why our leader, the next prime minister of Canada, the hon. member for Carleton, put this motion forward. It is because we are more worried than ever that Canadians may lose their homes because of the out-of-control deficit spending of the Liberal-NDP government.
Housing costs have gone up. They have doubled in this country after the Liberals spent $89 billion on housing. How does that even happen in a country like Canada?
This is the reality of the failed policies of the Liberal government. I met a single mom in Calgary recently, a single mom with three kids. Her rent went up by $600 a month. She was already struggling to feed her kids and keep a roof over their heads. She was literally in the stat of being the one in five who are skipping meals today. She told me her heartbreaking story of, because of the cost of her rent going up due to these deficits, having to move back in with her abusive ex-husband.
This is the reality of Canadians today. The Liberal-NDP government's failed policies have put Canadians in these types of positions. We can only imagine how many more of these stories we will hear as we travel the country. It is a sad state in Canada today. It should not be. However, after eight years of the Liberal-NDP government, it is definitely not worth this cost.
We are talking to industry stakeholders and everyday Canadians. We are hearing that people cannot get into housing because of supply. We are also talking to the people who actually build the homes. The number one issue today is interest rates, which were fuelled by the government's deficits. Builders will be sitting on land, and they will not be able to build. In some cases it does not make sense, with all the bureaucracy and with all the red tape created by the government. Along with a willingness to let municipalities create more and more bureaucracy, it is getting harder and harder to build, let alone how much housing costs have gone up for the builders. In some cases it does not make sense to build.
That is why we need to see a balanced, fiscally responsible plan for back-to-balance budgets. I hope the Prime Minister finally understands that budgets do not balance themselves.
An hon. member: Don't hold your breath.
Mr. Jasraj Singh Hallan: Madam Speaker, my colleague says, “Don't hold your breath”, and I will not.
Let us put this back into the context of why we brought forward this motion in the first place. It is because of a looming crisis that could take place in this country if the Liberal-NDP government does not bring back balanced budgets. I want to remind Canadians, once again, that it was the finance minister, back in November, who told Canadians, and promised Canadians in writing, that she would bring in balanced budgets in 2027-28.
I will take a step back to before that. It was the same finance minister who told Canadians to go out and borrow as much as they want, that interest rates would be low for a very long time. People started getting mortgages. We saw a big boom in people wanting housing. What those borrowers did not expect, after she said that, was that she would dump hundreds of billions of dollars of fuel on the inflationary fire, which made their interest rates go up. Now there is a looming crisis.
In November of last year, the finance minister promised to bring in balanced budgets. We had a hope that maybe the Liberal-NDP government had seen the light. However, once again, it was only months after that when she said that she was just kidding, that she was never going to balance budgets anyway, and then promised to balance the budget in the year never. Canadians lost all hope.
What we need to do today, under our common sense leader, is bring in a common sense plan to balance the budget, to bring down the inflation and to make sure that Canadians do not lose their homes. When the member for Carleton becomes the next prime minister of this country, we are going to bring home more homes, which people could actually afford; bring down costs; bring home lower prices by axing the failed carbon tax, which is inflationary and making the cost of everything go up; make sure that once we bring down the inflation by controlling deficits, people will not lose their homes.
We are going to bring it home for Canadians.
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- Oct/17/23 2:23:10 p.m.
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Mr. Speaker, after eight years under this incompetent Prime Minister, Canadians are already living with austerity, while the government, which is not worth the cost or effort, is living large. I met a worker from the Seaspan shipyard who bought an ordinary house in Vancouver. Because of interest rate hikes, he is now paying $7,500 a month for his mortgage, and $4,000 of that is interest.
Will the Prime Minister finally reverse his inflationary policies so that this worker can keep his house?
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- Oct/17/23 2:24:42 p.m.
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Mr. Speaker, after eight long, miserable years, the Prime Minister is not worth the cost. He massively increased the money supply by $600 billion, inflating housing costs by over 100%. That forced one Seaspan shipyard worker, who I met last week, to buy a normal house for over a million dollars. Now interest rates have gone up because of inflationary deficits, something the Prime Minister promised would not happen, and he is forced to pay $7,500 a month on his mortgage while supporting his three kids.
Will the Prime Minister reverse his inflationary spending so that this gentleman, his wife and three kids can afford to keep their home?
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- Oct/17/23 2:26:16 p.m.
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Mr. Speaker, the middle-class shipyard worker paying $7,500 a month on his mortgage is living austerity now. What the Prime Minister is talking about is abundance for the government and austerity for working class people, who must carry him and his overpriced bureaucracy around on their backs.
That gentleman has three kids, in their adolescence, to raise, paying for their sports while keeping a roof overhead. How does the Prime Minister expect them to pay $7,500 a month to fund his overpriced interest rates that result from his deficits?
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- Oct/17/23 2:49:08 p.m.
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Mr. Speaker, every day I hear from Canadians that after eight years of the Liberal-NDP government, they are unable to pay their bills. Recently, Rob wrote to me, telling me that he can barely afford his mortgage payments, so he and his wife have started selling off their personal possessions to pay their monthly bills. He realizes that the Prime Minister is just not worth the cost.
When will the Prime Minister stop his irresponsible spending, which is driving up inflation and driving up interest rates, so Canadians can afford their homes again?
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