- Member of Parliament
- Liberal
- Humber River—Black Creek
- Ontario
- Voting Attendance: 64%
- Expenses Last Quarter: $134,163.57
- Government Page
Mr. Speaker, I am really pleased this morning to stand and reference various areas in the fall economic statement. It was a very good statement that gave us an opportunity to see a focus on some of the areas that the government and all members of the House, I am sure, are concerned about and supportive of, especially for the residents of Humber River—Black Creek. The help for the cost of living, for dental care, for rent and for numerous other issues has been received very well by the residents of Humber River—Black Creek.
When the government released the 2022 fall economic statement, it talked about making life more affordable, which is something we hear a lot about and something we know is very important, and how we continue to grow an economy that works for absolutely everyone. The statement outlines a plan for continued support to help all Canadians with the cost of living and to build a Canada where no one is left behind. We are committed to continuing to help families cope with the increasing costs that we hear about every day and that we see every day when we go to the grocery store and to checkout counters.
Part of this is about making housing more affordable, which is another issue. Even in this morning's news, the top story was talking about housing affordability, and I believe the fall statement tries to address some of that. It also tries to strengthen and build a thriving net-zero economy with opportunities and jobs of the future. Amid global economic uncertainty and a reckless trickle-down economics approach pushed by some here in the House that benefits the wealthy, we are staying focused on making life more affordable for everyone and building an economy that will work for everyone.
We are investing in Canadians, including by eliminating interest on student loans and apprentice loans. I have been here long enough to have met many times with student unions from all universities across the country. They continually talk to us about how difficult it is to get student loans and how the interest continues to climb. Finally taking some action on that is extremely helpful and is very appreciated by that particular part of the community. Apprentice loans are another issue, and giving people time to get a job and additional time before they have to start repaying loans is important. With interest rates rising, eliminating the interest on those loans would be very much appreciated.
We are also talking in the economic statement about helping people buy their first home. I can say how important that is. We all know that. We all have grandkids or kids who are looking to buy their first home, and the fact that now they will have a $40,000 tax-free first home savings plan will really be a boost for the housing industry. It will be very helpful for many young people who are trying to buy their first home. It will also continue to attract investment in our clean economy and help create good, solid jobs.
Everyone should have a safe and affordable place to call home, and this is one of the reasons that with the 2022 fall economic statement, our government would deliver $500 in additional support to low-income renters. I have many renters in my riding, as others have, and the struggle to keep up with the increased cost of rental accommodation is very difficult. Some people will say that $500 once is not enough, but $500 is helpful as they move forward to try to deal with inflation, which hopefully is coming to an end, here in Canada at least.
The $500 is additional support under the Canada housing benefit specifically for low-income renters. This federal benefit would be available to all Canadians with an adjusted net income below $35,000 for families, so we are talking about families that are truly struggling to make ends meet, or below $20,000 for single Canadians who pay at least 30% of their income toward rent. In Humber River—Black Creek, I know lots of families that are struggling in that situation.
We are also creating a new refundable multi-generational home renovation tax credit to provide up to $7,500 in support for constructing a secondary suite, which will help families who take care of an aging grandparent at home or help parents afford to support a child with a disability moving back home, starting in January 2023. That is another step forward, when we talk about affordability and the lack of housing in so many different parts of our urban and rural centres. To be able to do some renovation of one's home that would allow one to have a second suite that would either provide rental income or enable an aging parent to age at home, is much appreciated.
The fall economic statement is also big news for students, as I mentioned earlier. It proposes to permanently eliminate interest on Canada student loans and Canada apprenticeship loans, including those currently being repaid, beginning on April 1, 2023. This would save the average borrower $400 per year. Recent graduates could also wait until they make $40,000 a year to start repaying their federal loans. These things seem like common-sense issues. If we are trying to encourage Canadians and our young people to take additional courses, whether it is apprenticeship or advancing their education, so that they can earn a better income and contribute better to moving Canada along, then we all want to see that they are not penalized at the end of the day, so helping them in a variety of different ways is quite helpful.
Our government is also doubling the GST tax credit to put hundreds of dollars in the pockets of those who need it the most. Starting November 4, 2022, so it is already moving forward, single Canadians without children will receive up to an extra $234, and couples with two children will receive up to an extra $467. Again, some people might say that is not enough, and ask why we bother. When we are stretching from one dollar to the next dollar to the next dollar, $234 is a lot of money, as is $467, to help feed the family and put the food on the table. Seniors, whom we talk about a lot and care immensely about, will also receive on average an extra $225.
We are also delivering much-needed relief for parents who cannot afford dental care for their kids under 12. That is an issue we have talked about for many years that I never imagined we would actually deliver, so I am glad we have started a program that truly is going to help our young children, because there are many of them who do not have any kind of coverage, so they do not see a dentist until something starts to hurt and they are forced to.
A third of Canadians do not have dental insurance, and in 2018 more than one in five Canadians reported avoiding dental care because of the cost, because it is very expensive. Our job is to help parents who struggle financially, by investing in their children's health care. Canada's dental benefit will provide parents or guardians with direct upfront tax-free payments of up to $1,300 over the next two years to cover dental expenses for their children under 12 years old.
Canada needs to also build the technology, the infrastructure and businesses to help reduce our carbon reliance, but this will not occur without rapidly increasing, and then sustaining, private investment in activities in sectors that will strengthen Canada's position as a leading low-carbon economy. That is why the 2022 fall economic statement launched the Canada growth fund, which will help bring billions of dollars in new private investment required to reduce our emissions, to grow the Canadian economy and to create well-paying jobs.
This fall economic statement also has support for hard-working Canadians, and that is in the new quarterly Canada workers benefit. We are moving this to an advance payment, because people who work really hard for really low pay cannot wait until the fiscal year is over to get a top-up. They need it while they are working, and they deserve it. We should be rewarding them for doing those hard jobs and encouraging them to continue.
I am very pleased to have had the opportunity this morning to speak to the fall economic statement, and I look forward to hearing comments from my colleagues in the House.
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Mr. Speaker, I want to thank the hon. member for his continued work in the House on behalf of all Canadians.
The whole issue of investing in people is an important part. We are investing in Canadians; we are not investing somewhere else. We are reinvesting tax dollars to help people have a better quality of life. When I think of the $10-a-day child care and why I am a huge supporter of that program, it is the fact that hundreds of single mothers have told me they cannot go anywhere or get an education because they cannot afford child care. Now their children are in child care and they are in school or getting jobs. They will not end up as seniors in poverty, because of having had access to these programs.
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Mr. Speaker, I absolutely did not mean to offend the hon. member. I know her passion when she speaks in the House, and I quite often applaud it and agree with many of the comments. However, I am very proud of what our government has done when it comes to housing. We have invested billions and billions of dollars across Canada with our rapid housing initiative, but all these things take time. They do not just materialize overnight.
I was told recently that a house that used to take eight months to build now takes 22 months to build. We cannot create them in mid-air, but the funds are there. It is happening all the way across the country, and I look forward to seeing some of those housing developments in the riding of my hon. colleague.
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Mr. Speaker, I will try to bring the temperature down a bit. We are here to debate and to discuss, but I do not want anyone to have a heart attack in the sense of trying to get a point across. The issue of housing—
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Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to answer my colleague's question. It is good to see him on the floor again. We have gone back and forth between us on a variety of issues.
I believe in investing Canadians. All our money does not come out of mid air. It comes from Canadians. It comes from each and every one of us. It is what we do with that money that matters. Investing in Canadians and giving them back the very money they have given to us in programs like eye care and health care, and investing in the right businesses that will grow the economy, all of those are important things that we have a responsibility to do to ensure that Canada continues to move forward. Money only comes from one place, and that is from each and every one of us.
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Mr. Speaker, I am glad to be back, glad to see you back in the chair here in the House and glad that we are getting on with the work that is important for all our constituents and for our country.
I want to speak to Bill C-31. Just in case viewers have lost track given previous speakers, what we are actually focusing on in Bill C-31 is part 1, the dental benefit act, which would provide interim dental benefits for many low-income families. Part 2 of Bill C-31 would enact the rental housing benefit act, which proposes a $500 one-time payment to eligible families with net incomes of under $35,000. Part 2 would empower the CRA to process the applications and payments for a one-time top-up payment of $500.
Bill C-31 is the beginning of a program for those most vulnerable, and it is our children under 12 who are going to benefit from that particular program. I would ask members to take a moment to think about when we were all in school. There were children who had significant dental problems. They were often bullied, abused and picked on. If this followed them through much of their lives and they continued to not be able to afford dental care, getting to high school and then the workplace and still not having the money required for the dental care they needed, what was that doing to their self-esteem and self-confidence as they tried to move along?
I would suggest that dental care is far more important than a lot of us might pay attention to. It is why I am so happy today to stand in support of Bill C-31. It is going to start us down a pathway of providing dental care to children under 12 of low-income families. This is the beginning of a new program that I think will clearly benefit all of Canada.
When we look at having to compete in the overall world, we need to be presentable. When we look at some of the homeless folks we see living on the streets, we notice one thing: They are all very badly in need of dental care. How long has that been? Have they been in that situation for many years? Is that part of what destroyed their self-confidence and self-esteem so that at one point or another in their life they are living on the streets?
Trying to tie it back, I think dental care is extremely important, and I am glad to stand today to support it along with the top-up on rental housing. As I said, when we think of dental care, we think about health and we think about finances, but dental care issues reach far beyond those two basic essentials. It is therefore of the utmost importance.
Let us think about it for a second. As I mentioned earlier, a person's healthy smile means healthy digestion, a healthy heart, healthy lungs and other respiratory organs and good overall health, because all of this is affected by bacteria in our mouths. Some of us may not realize that dental inflammation is a high risk for the brain for one simple physical reason: It is all located in the head.
Even more so, one's healthy smile is a social indicator that may affect the perception of our personality by other people. It is an indicator of one's well-being, which affects one's confidence and thus performance. If we talk to some of the folks who are struggling in our shelters and ask them what their life was like, clearly many of them do not have the confidence to go looking for a job, partially because of their appearance. Again, this goes back to their dental health.
However, given all of dental health's importance, it is not widely accessible. People are hesitant to address their dental health issues because it is expensive. For some it can be frightening as well. For many of the single-parent families that I represent and some of the low-income families, talking about going to the dentist is out of the question. They do not have any coverage whatsoever. To have to go to the dentist and put out $500 or $400 is just not possible for them. That is the kind of thing that gets put off, and eventually they have to deal with it but it could be much later on. It is about not having the resources.
As we move forward in our talks on dental care, I would hope we look at what the costs are in dental care. It is extremely expensive to go to dental school and become a dentist. We need to look at all avenues if we are going to try to improve the self-confidence of Canadians, avenues such as being able to become a dentist without having to mortgage one's house and whole future. It is very reflective in the prices that are paid and that is what prevents a lot of people from being able to access the help they need.
When we talk specifically about children's dental health, those limitations apply even more. For parents, especially in a tough financial situations, it is very difficult to convince themselves and their kids to go without groceries for a week because they have to go to the dentist.
A third of Canadians do not have dental insurance. In 2018, more than one in five Canadians reported avoiding dental care because of the cost. I do not think that is an unusual thing. An awful lot of people avoid going to the dentist until they are in severe pain. They certainly are not going for the average six-month check up and the kinds of regular things they should be doing. They go when they have no other choice than to get some assistance.
Our job, as representatives of all these families in Parliament, is to help the parents who struggle financially by investing in their children's health care to ensure we have done everything possible to help these kids grow up into healthy, socially active, confident and productive adults, future parents themselves.
With Bill C-31, our government makes a first step, or maybe I should say a leap, in ensuring an essential aspect of Canada's health care, namely dental care, is more accessible for those who need it. This support program would start with children under 12 in the period starting in October 2022 and ending in June 2024. The support would be allocated to uninsured families with an annual income of less than $90,000.
The list of reasons why dental health is important can be very long, but it always comes down to one thing: one's well-being. Well-being or happiness is a fuel for everything good we wish for our country: healthy families, active communities, a blooming economy and all other important things about which we care.
When we are talking about health care and child care, we have things that are necessary for a healthy Canadian society. I introduced a bill for first reading, which is coming up for second reading, Bill C-284. It calls for a national eye strategy. Apparently 75% of the blindness happening in Canada could be eliminated by more investments and more research. That bill will be coming up for second reading in November. It is about the health of Canadians overall. We can save money in a lot of different ways by ensuring were are making investments early on.
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