- Member of Parliament
- Member of Parliament
- Conservative
- Regina—Lewvan
- Saskatchewan
- Voting Attendance: 67%
- Expenses Last Quarter: $123,656.05
- Government Page
- Feb/6/24 7:51:16 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, our Liberal colleague just gave us a glimpse into the Liberal psyche. She said we never talk about the rebates when it comes to the carbon tax. My colleague from Battle River—Crowfoot hit the nail on the head: We do not have to give the money back to Canadians if we do not take it in the first place.
My colleague mentioned a couple of really great things when it comes to Conservative principles. Another one is Margaret Thatcher. She said the best thing I have ever heard about socialism: “The problem with socialism is that you eventually run out of other people's money.” That is what the Liberal government is starting to do. We cannot tax Canadians into oblivion and then wonder why they cannot afford food. We have taxed Canadians so much. That is why there are two million Canadians lined up to go to the food bank.
Does my colleague agree that Liberals would not have to give so much money back to Canadians if they were not taking it in the first place?
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- Feb/6/24 7:46:03 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, time and time again, we hear from the Liberals and the NDP, the costly coalition, that the government is doing well. They speak numbers about where they are at, according to other OECD countries, when it comes to GDP or debt-to-GDP ratio.
We heard in Saskatchewan, under the socialist NDP for so long in the 90s, that the government was doing well.
If this Liberal-NDP costly coalition is doing so well, why are Canadians hurting so much?
Why is food bank usage at two million people per month?
If the government is doing so well, why have Canadians never had it so bad?
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- Feb/6/24 7:35:54 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, today we got an Order Paper answer for the Conservative member for Dauphin—Swan River—Neepawa, which said that the Liberal government is not even tracking how much the carbon tax is reducing emissions. It really is mind-blowing that the Liberals have a flagship policy but are not tracking it to see whether it is successful or not.
What I am hearing from people on the ground is that they believe that the fact of food price increases because of the carbon tax is not a flaw but a feature of the Liberal-NDP carbon tax. They believe this is what it was intended to do, because they do not realize what the policies are that actually affect farmers, and how much they do so. I do not believe that the NDP and Liberal members thought the carbon tax would go up to $15,000 for a 5,000-acre farm in Saskatchewan, but that is the effect it has had. Just imagine when the carbon tax goes to $170 a tonne. What is that going to do to consumers across Canada when they go to buy groceries?
Farmers are price-takers. Input costs are going up and up, and they see a government that wants to keep kicking out their feet, instead of giving them the opportunity to be successful, by putting policies in place.
I am so proud of our agriculture producers. There is a study by from the Global Institute for Food Security, out of Saskatchewan, that said our producers create fewer emissions than any other comparable jurisdiction in the world. Agriculture in Canada produces 8% of our total emissions. We should be trumpeting that at every international event we go to and showing how proud we are of our farmers. They are producing more and doing it with fewer emissions than farmers in any other country. That is what we should be talking about on the world stage to make sure that more countries are following Canada's leadership when it comes to agriculture and agriculture emissions.
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- Feb/6/24 7:34:03 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, I will say this about what is going on, and members will not see this on mainstream TV. In Europe right now, farmers are in an uprising because of the terrible policies governments have foisted upon them. Whatever is going on in Europe and the European Union, they should keep it there because their farmers are protesting and taking to the streets.
We should make sure that our farmers are happy, that we put policies in place that respect farmers, that we listen to what farmers are doing on the ground, and that we make sure they get it right so we do not copy anything that is going on right now in Europe when it comes to farm policies.
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- Feb/6/24 7:21:11 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, it is my pleasure to join in the debate today around the price of food inflation; the report that came from the agriculture committee, which I am proud to sit on; and some of the ideas we have heard over the last little while about how increases in the cost of food have affected Canadians in their day-to-day lives.
My friend from Battle River—Crowfoot just had a great point that he asked my colleague from Kenora about, and I asked this of Tyler McCann in committee today. I asked whether the point of a carbon tax, which the Liberals and NDP opine is the great resource they are going to use to lower emissions, was to change consumers' behaviour. Mr. McCann said yes, it is. We can go on Environment and Climate Change Canada's website, and see that the point of a carbon tax is to change people's behaviour based on an increasing price of a product.
It just so happens to be a product we are talking about today, which is food. I said in committee that it is amazing that a government is now fighting its own policy. Liberals and New Democrats are scrambling over each other to say that the carbon tax has not worked, because it did not increase the price of food. It was really one of the first times in my life in public service that I have seen a government arguing that a policy did not work when it did.
I see this in other areas of people's lives too. We see it in transportation, where mothers are having a harder time filling up a tank of gas to take their kids to hockey games, to ballet classes or to music lessons. In rural Canada, we have to drive. There is not public transportation service like there is in downtown Toronto, so people are making a choice about how many extra shifts they have to pick up to cover the next tank of gas. We see it with seniors, who are still in their homes, asking how many sweaters they are going to have to put on because they cannot afford to keep the heat up.
We see it time and time again. The Liberal-NDP carbon tax is making people change their behaviours in Canada, because it has made everything so much more expensive across our country.
We know it is working, because there was a little caucus revolt in the Liberal Party recently; Atlantic Canadian members, along with the Conservatives, who have called for a long time to axe the tax as part of our plan, said they had to exempt home heating. The proof is in the pudding. Why would the Liberal members in the Maritimes fight tooth and nail? It is because they are having political issues to get a carve-out from the carbon tax, since home heating is costing too much. It is almost like it is working, but the people within the Liberal Party and the NDP did not realize how much pain they were going to inflict on Canadians.
There is no other solution to heat a 100,000-square-foot barn. Today, in Ottawa, I met with a dairy farmer from just outside Regina. He said his heating bill for the barn has increased and increased. I have a SaskEnergy bill from another farmer, a chicken farmer. For one month, their gas supply cost is $1,092. Their carbon tax, with the GST on top of it, is $1,071. They are almost paying more in taxes on a monthly bill, $20 less, than they are for the gas they are supplying to heat their building. Maybe I am giving them the benefit of the doubt, but I do not think the Liberals and the New Democrats realized how much this was going to hurt.
From APAS, in Saskatchewan, Mr. Boxall was at our committee when we were talking about food prices. He said that, on the average farm in Saskatchewan, the carbon tax cost will be between $14,000 and $25,000. However, when it goes to $170 a tonne by 2030, Canada's Food Price Report for 2023 stated that a farm could pay $150,000 in carbon tax per year.
We asked Mr. Boxall in committee how that was going to affect farms. He said that:
It will have a huge impact—$150,000 on a 5,000-acre farm. It's unfathomable that we will get there on a carbon tax alone. It makes my skin crawl to think that's where we'll be, and then to be turned around and not recognized for the work that is done, ensuring that we have proper grasslands and that we have proper management of our farm soil. Farmers are the biggest stewards of the land in this country, and we care more about the environment than we ever get credit for. It really is going to be detrimental to Saskatchewan farmers.
That says it all. This Liberal government continues to punish our farmers, the people who put food on our plate, without a second thought of what the effect is going to be.
We talked to some witnesses today in the agriculture committee and one witness laid out three things that this government has done and wants to do that will affect food prices. Number one, he said, was the carbon tax. Number two was P2 packaging where the government wants to make sure that, in Canada, we cannot use plastics to ship fruit and vegetables, which the U.S.A. has already said it is not going to do, and so it is going to cut the supply of fruit and vegetables in our country. Number three is the fertilizer reduction targets. Those three things are what this witness said is going to inflate the cost of food exponentially year after year. This is from people who are on the ground from the fruit and vegetable growers in Ontario.
So, are we not going to believe a carbon tax bill that we saw from Saskatchewan where they were paying almost as much in taxes as in gas supply? Are we not going to believe members from the Agricultural Producers Association of Saskatchewan, APAS, who are on the ground tilling the soil and planting the seeds who have said that $150,000 for a 5,000-acre farm will destroy farms in Saskatchewan, because it will make them unsustainable, which will lower supplies again? Are we not going to believe a dairy farmer who says that it is going to cost more and more each year to heat their barn with this carbon tax?
The PBO said that, by 2030, farmers will be paying $1 billion a year in carbon tax. My friend for Huron—Bruce, who has put this through on a private member's bill, talked about the GST and HST that we pay on the carbon tax, which is about $490 million a year. So, combined, the carbon tax and then the tax on the tax is going to be $1.5 billion automatically out of farmers' pockets, and people do not think that is going to have an effect on food prices. That is irrational. It is taking $1.5 billion out of farmers' pockets.
How are we going to make that up? Two things will happen: one, consumers will see that on the till at the grocery store, and prices will increase because farmers have to make that up; or two, farmers go out of business, and no farms, no food. If we lower the food supply in Canada, that will also increase the food cost. Members can see, and I agree with my friend from Winnipeg, that either way, consumers in rural or urban Saskatchewan are going to have to pay more for food.
At this point in time I would like to move an amendment, which will be seconded by the member for Battle River—Crowfoot. I move:
That the motion be amended by deleting all the words after the word “That” and substituting the following: “the 10th report of the Standing Committee on Agriculture and Agri-Food, presented on Tuesday, June 13, 2023, be not now concurred in, but that it be recommitted to the Standing Committee on Agriculture and Agri-Food with instruction that it amend the same so as to: (a) take into consideration that Bill C-234, An Act to amend the Greenhouse Gas Pollution Pricing Act, has been amended by the Senate in a way that will prevent farmers from getting a carbon tax carve-out for grain drying, barn heating and other farm operations, and that since the Parliamentary Budget Officer has made clear that this bill, in its original form, would save Canadian farmers $1 billion by 2030, reducing the cost of food for Canadian families currently struggling to afford groceries; and (b) recommend that the House adopt the motion rejecting the Senate amendments as soon as possible.
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- Feb/6/24 7:05:13 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, I want to commend that member for his audition for cabinet because there was not an answer in that comment. He is prepping himself for question period already. I wish him luck with that. He has two years left to make that move.
As a member of the agriculture committee, can he name one farmer he talked to, who has boots on the ground, planting, harvesting, dairy farming or poultry farming, who has come to him and said that carbon tax has helped their operation, that they are doing better, that it is a good thing that the Liberals implemented a carbon tax and that they cannot wait for it to go to $170 a tonne by 2030 to take $1 billion out of their pockets?
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- Feb/6/24 7:02:14 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, I will give my colleague a bit of time as he is quite new here. Just because he repeats something louder does not make something true. Catherine McKenna learned that lesson the hard way.
I would say that more than eight out of 10 Canadians suffer under the carbon tax and get less back. What is not being taken into account is the gas, the groceries and the home heating. There are so many times that the carbon tax hits Canadians again and again. The Parliamentary Budget Officer has already said that that is not true; six out of 10 Canadians are worse off from the carbon tax.
I want to get back to what we had a conversation about when it came to the agriculture committee. I saw the smile on the member's face, but what he could not say was how many farmers, not farm associations, but people who actively farm, he has met with have told him that the carbon tax has helped their farm and that they are better off with the carbon tax in place under the Liberal-NDP policy.
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- Feb/6/24 6:56:38 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, as always, one has to be very careful with the Liberals when they talk about truths and untruths. What Dr. Charlebois said was that there has not been enough data collected to see exactly what the effect of the carbon tax is on food prices. He also said that he called for a pause on the carbon tax to lower food prices. Charlebois has said that; conveniently, the member omitted this.
When one hears a story coming from the Liberals, it is always interesting to listen to the facts.
Talking to Mr. McCann, I also asked if the point of a carbon tax is to increase the price so that consumers change their behaviour. He said that this is exactly what the Liberals say the point of a carbon tax is.
The truth is that, when it comes to food inflation, food prices and the relationship with the carbon tax, it will come out in the wash that there is a correlation. When one talks to farmers and dairy farmers today, their highest input cost now is the carbon tax and the heating of their barns. If someone does not think that affects the price of what a farmer does, then they should maybe get out of downtown Winnipeg and go to a farm once their life.
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Madam Speaker, I appreciate the comments from my colleague, with whom I sit on the agriculture committee. Obviously, in this report, there was an examination of some of the input costs that have caused food prices to rise.
My question for my hon. colleague is this. On our opposition day motion to report Bill C-234 back to the Senate unamended, will he be voting with us as Conservatives to make sure that farmers get help in decreasing the inputs when it comes to Bill C-234?
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- May/30/23 3:03:13 p.m.
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Mr. Speaker, carbon tax 1 is inflating the price of groceries, making it more expensive for families to put food on their tables. Food bank use is at record highs and one in five Canadians are skipping meals. The average farm of 5,000 acres will pay up to $150,000 for the first failed carbon tax. Carbon tax 2 is only going to make things that much worse. Families cannot afford food.
When will this jet-setting, out-of-touch Prime Minister finally realize the more he goes woke, the faster Canadians are going broke?
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- Apr/26/23 7:23:56 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, I wish the member had read from his prepared notes, because everything he said was untrue.
First, I wish he would find a piece of literature that said I ran on a carbon tax in my riding. That would be interesting to see.
Second, if the member agrees with his environment minister, then he agrees that people are going to pay more in the carbon tax than they are going to get back, because that is what the environment minister said. It is nice that he finally agrees with the Conservatives.
Third, most people understand that we have to do something about climate change, but the hilarious part is the Liberals have never met a target they have made. They are 58th in the world in reducing emissions. That is a fact. That is from the recent COP. The fact that they think this carbon tax scam is actually going to lower emissions is false, and they should stop spreading misinformation to Canadians.
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- Apr/26/23 7:17:20 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, I am happy to take to my feet, and I have some follow-up questions about the Minister of Environment 's carbon tax scam, which has now been shown by the Parliamentary Budget Officer to take more money out of Canadians' pockets than the rebates put back in.
I have a few questions. I hope the parliamentary secretary does not need to read prepared notes on this one. Does he agree with the Parliamentary Budget Officer, who stated that Canadians are going to receive less in rebates than they are going to pay out in carbon tax?
Does he agree with his environment minister, who stated that same fact on a popular TV show when he said that it is true Canadians are going to pay more in carbon tax than they are going to receive back in rebates? Actually, some Canadians are going to pay between $1,500 and $1,800 more in 2030 than they are going to receive in rebates, which is something the Parliamentary Budget Officer confirmed in his latest report. I would like to hear the answers to that.
We have had this discussion about the carbon tax over the years in this chamber, and when I was a member of the legislative assembly, we also ran against the carbon tax in Saskatchewan. In Saskatchewan, a lot of people do not have any choice but to drive their own vehicles. They have to drive in rural and remote Saskatchewan on farms. People use their vehicles to get to and from work. There are no other options, as there are in urban Canada. Some of the people I represent see this as a wealth transfer from rural Saskatchewan to urban Saskatchewan.
How do the rural people feel in Nova Scotia? My sister is from Halifax. I know that, in Dartmouth, there are people who need to travel a lot to and from work. What are their options if there is no public transportation? Has the parliamentary secretary heard from his constituents that they are paying a lot more in carbon tax than they are getting back?
He is shaking his head “no”, but I am wondering if there are some people in Nova Scotia who have that feeling. Some members on our side say they have had conversations with people in Nova Scotia who feel the carbon tax has taken more out of their pockets than they are getting back.
We had the conversation around the supply chain and grocery stores. Obviously, when one charges more for fuel, anything that is trucked is going to cost more. Groceries have gone up through both inflation and the carbon tax.
Winters in Saskatchewan get pretty cold, and the same happens in Nova Scotia. Home heating costs have gone up exponentially because of the carbon tax. We know that in 2030, the gas tax, or the carbon tax, is going to be 41¢ a litre in this country. If the Liberals and the NDP do not think that is going to affect the price of anything that is trucked into our country, where it is going to hit the consumer harder than anyone else, they are fooling themselves.
We will continue to fight against the carbon tax scam. Once again, these are a few questions I have, which the parliamentary secretary should be able to answer without reading from his prepared notes from the PMO.
How does the carbon tax affect his people in Nova Scotia? Does he agree with his environment minister, who, after years of saying people are going to receive more in rebates, finally admitted the truth on national TV, that Canadians are going to pay more in the carbon tax scam than they are ever going to get back? Those are a couple of the follow-up questions I have for my hon. colleague.
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- Apr/18/23 3:02:23 p.m.
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Mr. Speaker, I am actually going to answer a question for the Liberals.
Earlier in question period, the Prime Minister asked if we know what friendship is. The answer is yes, but in Saskatchewan, when we have a friend, we share a case of Pilsner, not a private island, with them.
This champagne-and-caviar trip cost the taxpayers $162,000. It is amazing. This high-flying carbon hypocrite flies all around the world and then comes back home and charges a single mother triple the carbon tax to heat her home and feed her kids.
Will the Prime Minister cancel his out-of-touch carbon tax?
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- Feb/14/23 1:48:21 p.m.
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Mr. Speaker, this is an easy answer, and that is exactly the difference between Liberals and Conservatives. The Liberals think governments can always do it better. The Liberals think governments can take money from people and spend it better than they can. The Conservatives believe that individuals can do that better with some of their own money. The Conservatives believe that the private sector can solve some of these problems. The Conservatives believe that entrepreneurs in this country are what built it, not government.
Government is not always the answer to problems. Many times it needs to get out of the way, as I said. The member can believe that a government should look after people from cradle to grave, but some people are going to have different opinions.
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- Feb/14/23 1:47:01 p.m.
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Mr. Speaker, one of the first things I would not have done is given $20 million to Loblaws for new freezers. The Liberal government decided to do that and her party supported it. Therefore, the member should talk to her party leadership about supporting corporate welfare for Loblaws as well.
I talked about one thing that hurt the most vulnerable and that was a tax on everything, the carbon tax. It makes groceries more expensive for everyone. It makes the shipping of those groceries to the grocery stores more expensive. If we want to help the most vulnerable among us, the first thing we have to do is lower the taxes and control our spending to get inflation back down to that 2%.
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- Feb/14/23 1:45:34 p.m.
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Mr. Speaker, that is a very fair question. What we are talking about cutting is the $119 million to McKinsey & Company. What we are talking about cutting is the $15 billion in programs that went to prisoners, dead people and companies that did not need the COVID spending. What we are talking about is the $400 billion that the government said it was going to use for COVID programming but never used it. That is the Parliamentary Budget Officers' numbers. That is over $500 billion in spending that we are talking about already.
There is a lot of largesse that the Liberal government has spent over the years. There are a lot of places where we can cut and deliver better services.
I would ask my Bloc colleague this. There has been an increase in the public service, there has been an increase in contracting out and there has been an increase in spending, higher than any other government in the history of our country, but have we seen better services for our citizens?
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- Feb/14/23 1:44:12 p.m.
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Mr. Speaker, I always enjoy it when a Liberal shows up in Saskatchewan, because we have not had one since 2019.
Federated Co-operatives Limited is putting $1.3 billion into a renewable diesel plant and a canola crushing operation, which is going to be fantastic. What the government could do is appreciate some of that private money going toward making new jobs.
While we are on are on the topic of promises during elections, that government also ran on a promise to never to never increase the carbon tax over $50 a tonne. The member is going to have to go back and explain to his constituents why it is going to $170 a tonne, which will triple the cost of heating their homes in the winter.
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- Feb/14/23 1:33:08 p.m.
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Mr. Speaker, it is a pleasure to join in the debate this afternoon.
I have been sitting here for most of the morning listening to some of my colleagues' speeches. I am proud to see that the member for Timmins—James Bay still has Harper derangement syndrome, proud that he is still full-fledged with that last question.
The House leader for the NDP has full-on Harper derangement syndrome as well. He still blames the former prime minister for almost everything that has gone wrong in his life, probably that he did not get the Christmas present he wanted as well. Mr. Harper probably does not think about them whatsoever anymore, so I am glad he is still making breakfast in their kitchen.
I want to talk about a few things around competitiveness and how people are doing in Canada right now. The motion is quite long, and a few people did not get to the motion. The member for Kings—Hants talked about competitiveness more so than inflation. A few of the members started on the issue of inflation and how it was affecting Canadians. I want to really dive into that and how it has affected people in Regina—Lewvan and my community.
One thing I want to put on the record are a few comments that the Prime Minister a couple of years ago. I remember when the budget was delivered. Speaking through the national media to Canadians, he said that the government decided to take on the debt so Canadians would not have to. I will never forget that moment. As soon as those words came out of his mouth, I thought, if the government takes on debt, who eventually pays that back? It shows that he does not think about monetary policy. No government in the world has ever actually created wealth. They do not create revenue. The way the government gives revenue is that it takes it from people who work and pay taxes. It takes it from businesses that make revenue. The government does not create its own stream of revenue.
That was probably one of the most out of touch comments I have ever heard a leader of our country make. As my colleague, who just wrapped up, said, eventually the bill does come due, and it is the Canadian taxpayer who has to pay that bill.
We are seeing that in the very real result of inflation. I know that Tiff Macklem and random Liberals like Mark Carney and Bill Morneau are all talking about how inflation is more and more a made-in-Canada issue. That inflation has hit everyone hard. It has hit the parents trying to take their kids to sports and buy healthy groceries.
People take pictures of their groceries and send them to me to show me what $200 of groceries looks like, and it is four bags of groceries. It is a real issue for people right now trying to make good choices to feed their families.
As we have talked about in question period, parents are skipping meals so their kids do not have to; 1.5 million Canadians line up each month at food banks. We are the bread basket of the world, and 1.5 million Canadians are using food banks.
Members of the government and the coalition should listen to that. That is a real number. People are making these decisions to go to a food bank. They cannot afford groceries because of inflation.
One of the huge things that has driven up the cost of groceries is the carbon tax. When we have brought in opposition motions about scrapping the carbon tax, immediately everyone says that we do not have a environment plan. We will hear that from the NDP and the Liberals, that there is no environmental plan on this side and why would we want to scrap the carbon tax.
As we say all the time, a carbon tax is not an environmental plan; it is a tax plan. We can see it in the results. We asked our Liberal colleagues and the NDP, which always supports the Liberal carbon tax, about the results. What targets have they hit? Could they show us an emissions target they have hit in the last eight years to sell the carbon tax to Canadians. They are trying to sell it as this green plan but emissions have continued to go up.
At the last COP meeting, where everyone flew their private jets in and had a fancy gathering, we heard that Canada was 58 in the world in reducing its emissions. That is over the Liberal government's whole history. Being 58 in the world is not something to be proud of. Therefore, when the Liberals are trying to sell this carbon tax as a tax plan, it is not true. If they are trying to sell the carbon tax as an environmental plan, it is not working. Maybe they have to go back to the drawing board for something that actually would lower emissions across our country.
With regard to competitiveness, as my friend from Kings—Hants mentioned, I met with the Canadian Steel Producers Association. We had an all-party steel caucus. One of the things that it brought up was competitiveness.
I will take this time right now for a shout-out to say that my heart is with the 100 or so USW 5890 workers in Regina, who are on the verge of being laid off. One of the reasons they are having more layoffs at Evraz steel in Regina is because we cannot sell our product, because our country is being flooded with cheap steel from countries like South Korea, China and India. Their steel is costing pennies on the dollar of what our steel is costing. Because of the carbon tax, it is costs so much more now to make that steel.
We want to talk about being more competitive, and my friend is shaking his head and agreeing. He was on the Zoom meeting as well from Flamborough—Glanbrook, and I really appreciated his contribution.
One thing we can all agree on is that when it comes to made-in-Canada steel, it is way more environmentally friendly than any other steel that people are using in infrastructure projects in our country. We have the most environmentally friendly steel. We have a steel industry where our workers are treated well and they are paid a fair wage for a fair day's work. In a lot of other countries that does not happen. The fact is this. If we not only used more Canadian steel in our infrastructure and in our projects but exported it to other areas of the world, it would lower emissions in our country. That is just in one sector of our economy.
That is where we want to talk about competitiveness and what inflation does, not only to our whole economy and people's day-to-day lives but for the growth of our economy.
The Conservatives agree. We are always talking about growing that pie, not cutting it up into smaller chunks for each individual province or sector. We have an opportunity in our country now, coming out of COVID, to grow our economy, to get stronger and we do not see that happening with the current government.
I just heard the member for Winnipeg North say that they were going to build back better. Many Canadians would look him in the eye and tell him not to worry about building back better; just put it back the way it was. We hear this all the time, that we should quit trying to make things better because all the Liberals are doing is making Canadians fall further and further behind.
I was an MLA for eight years before I became a member of Parliament. One of the things I heard a colleague say was that sometimes one of the best things government could do was to get out of the way. Sometimes the best thing it can do is nothing and let the entrepreneurs of our country do it. Canadians are very good at knowing what to do with their own money. I say in many of my speeches that a dollar in the pocket of the person who made it is worth twice as much as having the government take it and spend it.
The Liberals were talking about their job numbers. Since February 2020, 80% of all the jobs made under the government were in the public sector. It seems like the Liberals have forgotten about the private sector and entrepreneurs, those people who invest their money and create jobs, where the government does not have to do it for them every day.
I am proud to represent Regina—Lewvan and to put some of the people's stories on the record today. Inflation is hitting everyone hard across our province and in our city. Under a government led by our new leader, we would take the tax off and keep the heat on.
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- Feb/14/23 1:12:14 p.m.
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Mr. Speaker, I appreciate that my friend from Kings—Hants talked about competitiveness. He had some really good ideas. I have heard of the issue with electronic logging devices, as well, when loading and unloading cattle, and some common sense approaches to that, but he did not touch on inflation very much or some of the spending his government has done that has added to that inflationary fire.
I have one simple question: Does he believe the CRA should try to get back some of the $15 billion that it said, by its own numbers, was spent on people in jail, companies that did not need it and even some people who are dead? Should we work hard on that? I know there has been an increase in capacity at the CRA. Why would we not be sure they would do the good work to get those hard-earned taxpayers' dollars back into the pockets of Canadians?
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Mr. Speaker, it is my pleasure to join the discussion today on the fall economic statement.
What we wanted to see is a plan for the future of all Canadians, but what we received from the Liberals in this fall economic statement is more reckless spending. We laid out two requests before the statement was delivered. One was no new taxes. The second was that if the government brought in more spending, it should find savings in the budget. That was not possible for the reckless Liberal-NDP coalition.
What we see right now is more spending and less money in the pockets of Canadians. We even heard the Governor of the Bank of Canada, Tiff Macklem, say that there is a made-in-Canada inflation problem. That is as a result of the reckless spending by the costly NDP-Liberal coalition.
I will go through a few of the spending items that we see as possibly unnecessary.
For one of them, the finance minister could not even answer a question. When asked about the $14.2-billion spend in the economic statement that is unaccounted for, she could not answer what it was earmarked for. As the finance minister of a G7 country, she should really have a better handle on where the money is going.
To add to the idea that the government right now is not in control of its spending, the Auditor General released a report today, and there are some very concerning things in it. A few of the numbers we saw today gave us a second to pause and wonder where the government is taking Canadians. One has to do with “overpayments to ineligible recipients” regarding COVID–19 spending. There was $4.6 billion in overpayments to ineligible recipients that the taxpayers of this country will never get back.
Let us not stop there. There is another one about “payments that should be investigated further” by the Auditor General. This was just released today, and there is $27.4 billion for further programs that we need to look into. One of my questions here, and I hope one of my Liberal counterparts will ask me about it, is whether the Liberals believe this needs to be investigated as well. Are they curious about where that $24.7 billion is that they said was necessary for COVID spending? I ask because we all remember the solemn hand-on-heart moment when Canadians were told by the Prime Minister that he has their backs.
Do members remember one of the last fall economic statements delivered by the current minister and the government? There was a famous line that will go down as one of my favourite quotes from the Prime Minister. He said the Liberals were going to take on debt so Canadians did not have to. How is that working for the government now?
I think Canadians across the country are wondering when exactly that is going to happen, because they have seen the government take on massive debt, more debt than all other governments combined. What I am seeing and hearing from Canadians across the country is they feel that this debt is now being passed on to them. That is how they feel. Where is this solemn pledge by the Prime Minister that the government is going to take on debt so Canadians do not have to? That is not a thing and Canadians are falling further and further behind.
I have a few examples of some of the discussions I have had.
This past weekend, I had the opportunity to speak with the Association of Canadian Custom Harvesters in Saskatoon. People from all over the country do custom harvesting. By the way, in question period, the associate minister of finance, who is from Alberta, keeps saying that there have been massive crop failures across the country, yet I did not hear that from the people who actually harvest crops. That is another one of the fabricated stories the Liberals continue to tell to make sure they have a compelling narrative to keep shovelling out dollars.
At this conference in Saskatoon, it was great to hear about some of the innovations and new technologies these custom harvesters are using to lower emissions. There were questions they kept coming back to ask me: How much is enough? For the carbon tax, what level will make the government happy? I was dumbfounded. I did not know how to answer that because I do not think it will ever be enough.
One of the custom harvesters actually does work across the border in Montana and the Midwestern states, and then comes back up. I asked him what the difference in his fuel bill is when he is harvesting down south across the border compared to when he is harvesting in Canada. He said it is between $15,000 and $20,000 a week. Could members imagine doing business in a different jurisdiction where it costs an extra $15,000 to $20,000 a week on something they have no control over? They have to fuel their vehicles. They have to fuel their harvesters and trucks. I asked him how it makes sense to keep going back and forth across the border. He said it does not. Then and there it just hit me that this is why we are becoming so uncompetitive. That is why the jobs are going south. It is because the current government is taxing businesses out of existence.
Then I remembered a quote I heard from one of the Liberal backbenchers, the member for Whitby. It all made sense when he stood in his spot and said to Canadians that they will have to go through pain. Can members imagine a government member standing up and saying that it is going to get worse? Can members imagine him saying he is not sure it is ever going to get better, but that Canadians can be sure that, as long as the Liberals are in government, it is going to continue to get worse for them, with more pain and suffering? I say “kudos” to that member because that is probably one of the first honest statements I have heard from a member of the Liberal Party in being honest with Canadians and saying that under the Liberals it will continue to get worse.
We see that situation across the country. One of the biggest things that hits me when I look at some of the statistics here is that 1.5 million Canadians are using a food bank every month in our country when we are supposed to be the breadbasket of the world. We have the food, fuel and fertilizer the world needs and we cannot feed our own people.
I opened the mail the other day when I was at home and my wife brought a letter to me. We are both U of R alumni. It was from the University of Regina. Usually people get these fundraising letters when it is for a capital project or some kind of infrastructure project. My wife said, “You will never believe this is coming from the University of Regina.” I read the fundraising letter and it was literally to feed students. It was an anonymous letter from one of the students saying that they go to bed hungry almost every night. There are 58.6% of university students at the U of R who are going to bed hungry. This is in our country now and it is shameful. From where we were to where we are now as a country, the food bank usages are up. Students are living in hostels and going to bed hungry, and they were looking for a vision from this economic statement. The government cannot spend itself out of inflation.
We are getting to another point where, if there are two more interest rate rises in this country, we are going to see a rash of bankruptcies. What is the Liberals' plan for that? Times are getting tough. I know people on variable mortgages whose mortgages have gone up $600 or $700 a month. Now it has come out that grocery bills are going to go up $1,000 to $1,500 per month. Eventually, there is nothing left.
In our country, under the current Liberal government, taxes now exceed take-home pay for people who are going to work every day. This is unsustainable in our country. We need a vision and we need a plan. We need to start making paycheques pay again. We need to make it so that people who are going to work have the ability to support their families and do not have to put water in their milk so they can make it go further for the kids. Parents are literally now scared to take their kids to the grocery store. I have constituents who have sent pictures to me of what $100 in groceries is buying for their family now, and it is sad. It is a couple of loaves of bread, maybe a jug of milk, some pasta and some pasta sauce. That is not good enough.
I will leave members with a quote. It is something Premier Wall always said when we were in government. He said that the best thing a government can and should do is leave things better than it found them. The current government has failed on that miserably.
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