- Member of Parliament
- Member of Parliament
- Conservative
- Sherwood Park—Fort Saskatchewan
- Alberta
- Voting Attendance: 67%
- Expenses Last Quarter: $170,231.20
- Government Page
- Apr/8/24 12:54:41 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, I am not aware of some of the long-tenured, historical events about which the member is speaking. I am a relatively young member of the House, so events before a certain date are before my time.
It is pretty rich for the Liberals, after eight years in power, to always want to draw our attention to things that happened in decades past. The fact of the matter is that since 2015, the national debt has more than doubled. More than half of our national debt is the responsibility of the Prime Minister. That is why we are now spending more on debt servicing than we transfer for health care. It is outrageous, out-of-control spending under the government. The $60 million for the arrive scam scandal is important, but it is part of a larger pattern of cost, crime and corruption. I mentioned some of these numbers in my speech, such as over 600 companies just doing staff augmentation. It is out of control.
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- Jan/30/23 6:48:18 p.m.
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Mr. Speaker, here are the facts. The Prime Minister has more than doubled the national debt in his eight years in office. The Prime Minister has run up more debt in these eight years than all of the previous prime ministers had up until that point. That is the reality of the legacy of the Prime Minister. That is causing inflation. It is causing Canadians to suffer. Of course, some other countries have pursued similar kinds of policies and they are experiencing the same challenges as a result. However, there is a better way. That is to control spending and focus on what is truly important to Canadians.
Much of the growth in spending we have seen, as I talked about, has been to outside consultants. We have dramatic growth in the core public service but, at the same time, we have a government contracting out to consulting firms like McKinsey that it is personally close with for services that are supposed to be done in the core public service. That is driving inflation and driving paying Canadians' experience.
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- Nov/23/23 10:48:58 a.m.
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Mr. Speaker, lately the government likes to claim it has had a conversion to being concerned about affordability. Meanwhile, for years it has been running a horrifying economic experiment. It has massively increased spending and more than doubled our national debt. We know now that it is spending more on debt servicing than it is sending to the provinces for health care.
Outrageous amounts of money in debt servicing costs are making life less affordable for Canadians. Fundamentally, since the Liberals claim to have had this conversion to being concerned about affordability, will they tell the House when the budget will be balanced?
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Madam Speaker, I want to pick up on the point about certainty for the long term.
The Liberal government has run up more debt in its period of office than the country has in its entire history up to that point, and is continuing to fund these and other promised expansions of social spending through deficit spending. The fiscal context actually leaves a lot of Canadians uncertain that any of these kinds of programs would be there in the future, not because of political debates or the positions of any particular individuals but because of the fact that the Liberal government is making promises on the basis of deficit spending, promises that would in fact continue to cost more. This is in a context, by the way, where many Canadians still do not have child care.
I wonder how the member could justify his claim that this is providing multi-generational certainty, when in a substantive sense these programs are not funded?
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Madam Speaker, I agree with many of the things my friend and colleague said, at least with respect to our needed engagement in the world.
Respectfully, the government was a little behind. I recall the first throne speech the government came out with in 2015 talked about the need for “a leaner military.” We have been pushing the government, prior to this invasion, to do more in terms of sanctions and weapons supplies.
I hope the member will continue to urge her government to do even more, because I think she put her finger on the right point in terms of the critical importance of supplying weapons.
The member spoke about the issue of debt at the beginning of her speech. Sometimes we make the mistake of comparing Canadian federal debt to other countries' federal debt, when actually in Canada we need to take into consideration the total level of government debt. Canada has very high total government debt when we consider the fact that many of the services that are provided in our country are actually provided by other levels of government.
Federal debt has more than doubled in the time the Prime Minister has been in office. I would submit that, if we are so far in debt that we would not be able to afford to lead anymore, is the member concerned about the debt levels and the impact as interest rates rise?
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Madam Speaker, I thank my friend for her commitment, her sincerity and her passion. She presented us with a wish list for a world without scarcity, which I would say, quite honestly, is not the world we live in. That is a function of the reality of the human condition, not of anything else. She and I both hope for a world in which scarcity does not exist.
In the world we live in, we have to face tradeoffs. It seems to me that policy-making is about those tradeoffs. Realistically, one cannot simply say that we want to spend more here and spend more there without asking where it all comes from. We are in a situation where, in the midst of this pandemic alone, the government has run up a deficit that has created a national debt of over $1 trillion in this country. I think about my kids and the cost they will have to pay. That has to come from somewhere.
I would like to work with the member and other members on the issues she talked about: combatting poverty and making it easier for people to have the opportunities they need. To me, that comes from growth of jobs and opportunity—
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