44th Parl. 1st Sess.
November 23, 2023 10:00AM
Madam Speaker, it is always an honour to rise in this place to join the debate. I will be sharing my time with the excellent member of Parliament for Prince Albert.
Bill C-56 is an interesting bill, and I must give the Liberal government some credit for taking a page directly from the leader of the official opposition's affordability plan and proposing to remove the GST from purpose-built rental housing. This is something that Conservatives support.
I must admit that I was a bit surprised to see the Liberal government admit that removing a tax, in this case, the GST, is a good way to increase affordability, much as I was shocked to see the Liberal government admit that removing its carbon tax on home heating oil is also a good way to increase affordability. If only it would remove its carbon tax on propane and natural gas to increase affordability for all Canadians and not just those in certain regions of the country.
Back to the bill, I also support the proposed amendments to the Competition Act, just as I supported my colleague from Bay of Quinte when he introduced his Bill C‑339.
It is refreshing to see a Liberal government adopt Conservative solutions. I even have to give the Prime Minister a little credit. Removing the tax on goods and services relating to the construction of rental housing means that builders and developers will save money. It means that less money will end up here in Ottawa. We all know how much this Prime Minister likes spending other people's money. Despite reduced revenue, our perennially spendy Prime Minister did not label this an austerity bill—not yet, anyway. Maybe he will change his mind when he reads the bill and realizes he is endorsing Conservative ideas.
Regardless, the Prime Minister has demonstrated remarkable restraint by introducing a bill that will reduce Ottawa's revenue and not calling it an austerity measure.
I pause for a moment, though, to ask this place a question. If the Liberal government is capable of understanding that removing the GST from rental housing increases affordability and that removing the carbon tax from home heating oil also increases affordability, why does it still refuse to remove the carbon tax from natural gas and propane to increase affordability? Do Canadian families who heat their homes with natural gas and propane and who cannot pay their bills not matter?
I have heard the Liberal excuses around this. Home heating oil is expensive and the carbon tax makes it more expensive, so that is why they are giving them a carbon tax break, but the same is also true for those who heat with natural gas and propane. Basically, this government is telling them that they do not matter. This is a Prime Minister who once said, “a Canadian is a Canadian is a Canadian”, but that is no longer true if one heats one's home with natural gas or propane. Sure, one might be on the verge of bankruptcy or hitting the food bank every day, but this Liberal government just does not care.
I know some members would say that I am getting a bit off track, that we should be debating what is in this bill. That is my point. The things in this bill would help, but the things we could do to most help Canadians right now, such as removing the carbon tax from all home heating fuels, we are not doing solely because the government is punitive.
This morning, we read about the Liberals' so-called affordability retreat, where taxpayers got stuck with a bill for $160,000, including rooms that cost anywhere from $1,200 to $3,200 apiece. The very Liberals who stayed in those rooms have the audacity to tell those who can no longer afford to heat their home at the end of the month that they will get no help. Worse, their carbon tax bill will actually be quadrupled. I would simply ask the obvious: Why not do more?
Why not offer Canadians who heat their homes with natural gas and propane the same carbon tax relief as those who heat their homes with home heating oil? Why does this Prime Minister always have to divide Canadians? This time, he is dividing them based on their heating fuel. Canadians have had enough of this.
Every poll sends the message loud and clear about where the Liberals stand, yet the Liberal government ignores that message. To what end? I know there are good people on the government side, but the arrogance of the Prime Minister and his powerful group of unelected insiders is hurting many Canadians.
Yes, the proposals in this bill will help. It is a start, but we seriously need to do more. That is why I talked about doing more. That is why the leader of the official opposition listens to Canadians every day. They are asking us to do more. Polls show they want relief from the carbon tax on their home heating bills.
Farmers want and need a break as well. Here in Canada, we introduced something called “marked gas”. The idea was that farmers could buy gasoline and diesel at lower costs, without additional taxes, because all of our predecessors from all political parties recognized that keeping farmers' costs low was in the public interest. Now the Liberal government is literally driving up the costs for farmers for ideological reasons.
I will share a story of a local small business owner. This small business owner is a value-added food processor. It is very important to this small business owner that, when his goods arrive at local grocery stores, they proudly say that they are 100% Canadian. Here is the thing: When he gets his raw goods, they come from Quebec and Atlantic Canada, and when he has them shipped out via transport truck, he now pays a carbon tax surcharge on the bill.
He must raise his prices to offset the extra carbon tax that he pays. If he were to get the same raw goods out of the United States or overseas, he would not have that same large carbon tax surcharge from goods being shipped across Canada. He might be at that point where the only way he can lower his prices and remain competitive would be to switch because many of his competitors in the same grocery stores cannot say that they are also made in Canada. They are made in other jurisdictions where there is no carbon tax. When times are tough, as they are right now, fewer people can afford to pay extra for goods solely because they are made here in Canada.
I hope the government realizes the long-term structural damage its carbon tax is creating. It would be a different story if our largest trading partners had the same carbon tax and it was a level playing field. The Liberals like to say that they are taking a leadership role with the carbon tax. However, when no one else is following, they are not leading the way.
Some may think that I was not objective in this debate, but when I go home and my constituents ask me what we are doing in Ottawa to make life more affordable for them, I would like to have more to offer than simply saying that I supported this bill. At least I can tell that small business owner and others like him that I shared their stories.
Unfortunately, however, we have a Prime Minister and a Prime Minister's Office who do not care about any of them, unless they use home heating oil, of course.
That said, yes, I will support this bill and I will continue to ask this Liberal government to adopt and better support our Conservative ideas. Let us put all home heating fuels on a level playing field and suspend the carbon tax.
Let us ensure that the carbon tax on farming is gone. Let us all read the Scotiabank report that tells of how government spending at all levels has created over 40% of the rise in basis points from the Bank of Canada. It is not austerity to think like a taxpayer and deliver value for money. What a concept. It is not an app that costs over $54 million or funding the Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank. How about the Canada Infrastructure Bank, which does not deliver any infrastructure?
Literally every day, we read about a new spending scandal from the Liberal government and appointed insiders funnelling money to their own companies. How could someone not know that was wrong and unacceptable? How are people such as Laith Marouf on the government contract list? Why is there never any ministerial accountability?
Instead of fiscal waste, we should be doing more with what is here. I urge all members of the House of Commons to consider doing more and adopting our Conservative ideas to provide Canadians a carbon tax break on home heating, and let us have a carbon tax carve-out for our farmers.
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- Nov/23/23 6:53:49 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, I am going to ask for your patience with me because I am going to describe that particular question, not the questioner but the question, as political loser talk. If he wants to come to this place to talk about affordability, with doing things like increasing competition, which the member for Bay of Quinte originally proposed and is now incorporated in this bill, we could have that discussion.
Instead, he wants to trash-talk my leader. I am going to be holding the Prime Minister to account for the actions of his government. I am going to give some credit where it is due when he takes good ideas, such as tax cuts and increased competition, from Conservative benches and incorporates them into bills. I will give Liberals credit when they do that, but when they trash-talk, I am going to call them out. That member is guilty of trash talk and should be fined by the court of public opinion in his constituency.
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Madam Speaker, the member is one hundred per cent right. We are going through a housing crisis, and it is because municipal gatekeepers, right across the country, have held tight to old ideas such as zoning that basically keeps municipalities as they are. As our immigration grows, and as our population grows, we see there are just not enough places for everyone.
In Bill C-56, the government's solution is a Conservative one, and it is to take the GST off and create more demand for something by lowering the cost of it. However, the problem is the speNDP-Liberal government's continued obsession with spending at any cost, any time, anywhere and any place, and we end up seeing much higher inflation.
As I said in my speech, the Scotiabank report said that up to 40% of the basis points of the Bank of Canada have gone up. We will not see significant market investments or significant government investments go forward unless we have lower interest rates. It is the economics that are a pressure here. Maybe Bill C-56 would allow some Venn diagram where everything falls into place of some projects now being viable, but I am already seeing in my area of the Okanagan projects dropping. We are seeing, in the Statistics Canada numbers, a drop in permits. That is inevitable until the economy turns around, and it will not do that if the government keeps spending like there is no tomorrow.
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- Nov/23/23 6:57:45 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, I actually wrote in my MP report to my constituents this week exactly that: All levels of government have been overspending.
However, let us not forget what I called the Prime Minister earlier this week: “our deficit-maker-in-chief”. No one has the fiscal power like the current federal government. No one has the tax power like the current federal government. What were the members of the government doing this week? Instead of actually trying to show some leadership and actually reducing, they have been going through an NDP wish list, which is one of the reasons we keep referring to the fact that after eight long years of the NDP-Liberal government, it is just not worth the cost. It is Canadians who are paying that bill, and they will keep paying that bill until they kick the current government out.
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