- Member of Parliament
- NDP
- North Island—Powell River
- British Columbia
- Voting Attendance: 65%
- Expenses Last Quarter: $145,542.18
- Government Page
- Apr/17/23 2:15:26 p.m.
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Mr. Speaker, in my riding of North Island—Powell River, every community I serve is in desperate need of housing. The top three reasons for housing insecurity are a lack of affordable rents or mortgages, low wages and housing in major need of repair with no resources to fix it. Indigenous people are four times as likely to be unhoused.
People with core housing needs in my riding are single-income families; those who live on a fixed income, such as seniors and persons living with disabilities; lone-parent households; and indigenous households. This issue requires a real partner in the federal government, and our region is simply not seeing that.
My constituents have ideas, such as redesigning the reaching home program's rural and remote funding stream. My communities have sent meaningful and thoughtful feedback. I urge the government to listen to it; prioritize rural, remote and indigenous communities; define affordability based on local realities, not market values; invest in non-market housing; and make capital investments into the upkeep of aging properties to keep people housed.
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Mr. Speaker, I am very honoured every day to stand up in the House. Today, we are talking about the fall economic statement. Before I talk about that, I just want to take a moment at the beginning of my speech to recognize that the bodies of indigenous women have been found in Winnipeg and an alleged Winnipeg serial killer has been identified.
I think collectively in the House, and hopefully across all of Canada, we are sitting with the deep horror of that reality and what that means for all of us. It is shameful that we live in a country that still does not value indigenous women and girls and our LGBT community. We see it demonstrated repeatedly. I hope all of us are carrying this in our hearts and that we continue to carry it in our hearts and our minds every day until this stops.
Coming back to the fall economic statement, I want to talk about some of the concerns I have around this economic statement. We are all hearing from constituents who are struggling every day to afford the basic necessities in their lives. We hear about the increasing use of food banks. We also hear from so many families who are eating substantially less. Parents are acting like good parents and are not eating as much so their children can go to bed with full bellies. That is something that we should all be listening to.
We know that inflation is certainly a part of the problem. However, we also know that greed is a huge part of the problem as well. In my community, I hear from a lot of indigenous elders and they consistently tell me that greed is an illness. They have a lot of traditional ways of dealing with greed, because it is seen as a sickness that will hurt our communities at large. I wish that, in this place, we could also see it as a sickness that needs moderation. It needs systems in place to stop it.
We know that Loblaws has seen record profits. It is profit like it has not seen in well over five years. It is profit that is so substantial that we hear it is making $1 million extra a day. That concerns me greatly. As we are having this discussion, it is important that we recognize that this fall economic statement does not really substantively address that issue and I hope that it will soon.
We know that the Canadians for Tax Fairness have said that the costs from inflation are more than what is passed on to consumers. That means that inflation is passed on to consumers but more is added. In my opinion, that is simply greed. We need to address that issue so that we hold the people who sell us our food accountable.
I remember a constituent once told me, “Rachel, we are not consumers; we are Canadians.” Every day when I am in the House, I really try to remind myself of that as we look at our systems and recognize some of the challenges in them.
I also did not see a substantial enough increase for housing. I know that on November 25 in my riding in Campbell River, there was a conversation on housing. Many representatives from communities throughout my region were participating. I heard again and again, like I do so often, that housing is simply a crisis. If someone has a fixed income or a low income, it is getting harder to find a place to live. A lot of people are living outside. There is a lot of snow in my area, which is fairly rare, but it is having a huge impact.
We also know that a lot of seniors are couch surfing. When I get calls from people in their eighties who are moving from friend's house to friend's house and sleeping on couches, it just means there is something substantively wrong in this country. I want to remind Canadians that the federal government really has not been part of the housing strategy in this country since 1992. I appreciate that the government has put some money into it, but if we leave a wound festering like that for so long, it is really hard to fix it. That is what we are seeing here.
I want to thank the Campbell River Community Foundation and the Campbell River and District Coalition to End Homelessness for all of their work on this particular file. We heard from small communities and indigenous communities. They are left out. The federal funding is not working. Indigenous communities are not getting the supports they need from the government and it needs to be better.
I also have concerns that we are not talking about GST on home heating. We know that this would help. It is not the biggest help, but put together with a lot of things, it would help hard-working people across this country be able to pay for their heat when we hit the cold season.
We still have not seen a meaningful windfall tax. That is such a gap. We need to have more structures in place. Again we will hear from the government on this, but it has not fixed the problem. It has done a few tweaks, but it has not taken that comprehensive look at the fact that people are making a lot of profit off the labour of Canadians and they are not paying their fair share. Ultrawealthy people are hiring accountants who can help them pay very little, but everyday people are paying all of their taxes. That is wrong and we have to fix it.
There are a few things that I am very much in support of in this bill as well. I was excited to read about the Canada recovery dividend. This is something that the NDP has been asking for. It is temporary and maybe we do not want temporary, but it is there. It is a one-time tax of 15% of taxable income over $1 billion, so it is getting at some of those profits. The other thing we know is that in this country a lot of corporations, after the pandemic, have done extremely well very quickly. In fact, many of them are making more profit than before the pandemic. We need to question that, we need to understand it and we need to make sure that they pay their fair share.
This dividend would also increase corporate income tax on banks and life insurance groups by 1.5%. That is getting some of that windfall tax and putting it back into the coffers. It is making sure that people in our communities get things like appropriate housing, dental care and a bit of support to help with their rent when they pay way more than 30% of their income on rent.
Those things will make a difference, but we also know that the Parliamentary Budget Officer has been very clear that if this Canada recovery dividend were put on big box stores and the oil and gas sector, we would see an increase of revenue to Canada of about $4.3 billion. We need to question this. Again, I keep coming back to this and the NDP will continue to keep coming back. When we see groups of people and big corporations making significant profits when other people cannot even feed their families and other people are living on the streets, Canada has an obligation to address this issue. Therefore, these are some steps in the right direction, but we still need to see more.
There is another thing that I am in support of and I am looking forward to seeing finally implemented. I know the NDP has been fighting and talking about this for many years. It is the removal of the federal portion of interest on student loans. We spend a lot of time in the House talking about young people and about the fact that they do not have enough to buy a house and that they are struggling, sometimes with several jobs in a very changing economy, to address the needs that they have and to have a future that they can believe in.
This is one step. It is not the only step that should be taken on behalf of young people. The federal government has to do more, but it is something that really would support a lot of young people and allow them not to have that burden. They go to school so that they can contribute to their community and to their country. If they have to spend all of their time trying to find a way to pay off their loans, then they do not get to do the things that will make all of us as Canadians a lot more substantive and healthy.
In closing, I want to say that I will be supporting this bill. I believe fundamentally in the fact that people need dental care, and I am really excited to see that come out the door. We know that we still have work. I am really excited to see next year that seniors finally get dental care. I do not know about the rest of the MPs in this place, but I have had a lot of seniors come to my door and talk about the fact that they cannot afford basic dental care and what the impact of that is in terms of their health and well-being.
I look forward to answering any questions.
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- Dec/2/22 11:03:23 a.m.
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Madam Speaker, I want to start by thanking all those helping with the warming centres across my riding. It is cold and snowy, and people need help. Housing is a human right, and Canada needs to start acting like it is. On November 25, a vital conversation on housing security was hosted by the Campbell River Community Foundation. I want to thank the co-sponsors: the Campbell River and district homelessness coalition, a coalition that brings stakeholders together to address homelessness; the City of Campbell River; Leith Wheeler Investment Counsel; Strathcona Regional District, BC Housing and CMHC.
People participated from many parts of my riding, and they all agreed that housing is a crisis everywhere. From Cortes to Port Hardy, to Gold River to Campbell River, to Powell River, every corner of our region is struggling. A clear challenge I heard was that small communities find the application processes leave them out, although their needs are so high.
Our innovative communities are doing so much, but Canada must finally step up to support housing in rural and remote communities. I am asking it to do so now.
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Madam Speaker, I always enjoy how loudly the member speaks. I never have to wear a earpiece. In fact, if I do it actually hurts my hearing, so perhaps we should have a warning when he speaks in the House.
In all honesty, I represent a large rural and remote riding and, in some of my smallest communities of 3,000 people, we are seeing homelessness reach a state that I never thought possible. Part of the reason is that there is no non-market housing, housing that is really reflective of the need, so that when people get there they are only spending about 30% of their income, which we know is best for everyone.
With all of the discussions the member was having, why is there not an investment in getting that housing out the door so that people can have that respect they so well deserve?
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Madam Speaker, my question to the member is really on the idea of non-market housing. In my riding, I look across the large region of North Island—Powell River and I am hearing again and again from people who have nowhere to live. I am talking to people with professional jobs: good, decent-paying jobs who are living in RVs because they simply can find nothing else to live in.
Our market is hot. People are buying up houses so rental units are gone, and they are gone quickly because people are selling them at an outrageous profit. We need non-market housing. We need it for low-income families. We need it for moderate-income families and also for folks who are making good incomes but cannot afford anything else because the rent costs are going up startlingly, as well.
Can the member talk about when the government is going to get serious about non-market housing so we can actually see people be able to afford to live, and young people able to afford houses in the future?
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- Apr/4/22 4:00:30 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, in my riding of North Island—Powell River we are seeing a lot of folks without housing. This is a growing concern. The market in our region is very hot. People are coming from all over the country to live in the beautiful area, but it is just making it so hard for local folks to be able to afford housing. At the same time, as those houses are being bought up, we are seeing fewer and fewer available rentals.
I am wondering if the member could speak to why we need to see affordable housing across this country. I am also wondering if he has any thoughts about when the government is going to do what it promised and ban blind bidding.
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- Mar/29/22 6:23:37 p.m.
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Mr. Speaker, I thank you, as always, for acknowledging me here so that I can do my work in the House.
We are here today to talk about a motion that commits to another study. When we look at the reality of seniors across this country, what we know is that the bar of dignity for so many seniors has been lowered yet again. I always use the bar of dignity as my reference point, because I fundamentally believe that all Canadians should be treated with dignity. They should be able to feel that they can take care of themselves, and that when they go out and need essential things, they can get those things.
I agree with the motion before us. I think it is important that seniors be treated with dignity, that they not be overwhelmed with financial worry, and that they not be worried about their retirement savings running out. I think it is important that seniors should be able to live independently in their homes. Those are all important things. However, I also believe that there are a lot of shelves in this place filled with reports about how that is true and what next steps we need to take to make that happen. Here we are: We have a non-binding motion that is going to maybe result in a study so that there is yet another report on a shelf somewhere talking about what seniors fundamentally need in our country. I just do not know how long seniors want to wait to have these things addressed.
Earlier today, I met with representatives from Single Seniors for Tax Fairness. I really appreciated my time spent with them, talking about how the realities of our system benefit seniors who are married or in relationships, and that there is this huge, growing gap for our single seniors who have to look after themselves on their own. These are largely women who maybe worked at great jobs where they had a great income or had worked jobs that were low-income. To me, both of those are incredibly valuable and should be honoured and respected, but at the end of the day, they are the exact stakeholder group that is worried about whether they are going to be able to live with dignity for the last years of their lives and whether they are going to be able to pay for the essential things that they need.
I remember, several years ago, that we did a pretty substantive study on a national seniors strategy. I still think it is unbelievable that we do not have a framework in this country that says, “Hey, we have a large population of people who are aging, and because of that we should probably have a plan federally about how we are going to work with that and how we are going to work with provinces and territories in a meaningful way to make sure that none of the seniors across this country gets left behind.”
Unfortunately, COVID showed us that seniors are being left behind. We saw it again and again in horrific ways. This was not something that should have surprised Canadians. We have been hearing from these folks, and from groups that advocate for them, that we do not have the proper infrastructure in this country. When it comes to care facilities, we do not have the systems in place that really focus on making sure that people are cared for in a respectful way. We got to see it in the most horrific ways, and I do not think that this study or this report on a shelf would make a difference.
I am really torn. Do I think it would be good to have more information about what we need to do better? Maybe, but what I am really interested in is something that is actually going to make the action happen: something that is going to look at the reality that people are living longer and that their retirement savings have to last substantively longer, and something that is going to look at how money can be moved around and at what age one has to move over to a RIF. Those are important things to talk about. However, I also know that a lot of that work has been done.
We need solutions and not studies. I really mean that, because I have talked to so many seniors across this country and in my own riding. Seniors have talked to me about the fact that they have to cut their medication in half, especially in the early months of the year when they have not paid the amount that means they get free medication. Seniors are putting their health at risk for the first few months, because they cannot afford to pay what they need to pay to get the medication they need.
When we look at housing, the reality is that affordable housing that is safe for seniors is getting harder and harder to find. We just saw, with the GIS clawback, a lot of seniors lose up to 100% of their GIS.
How many of those seniors actually lost their affordable housing? They are going to get that extra money, which is okay, but they are living in a place that is far more expensive than they were before and they simply do not have the money to make ends meet.
When we look at these solutions, they have to make sense for seniors. Doing another study is making a promise that we will do a study and maybe the government will do something about it this time. I am not persuaded that I will support this. I hear that everybody else looks at this and thinks this is a nice study, let us do that and no harm done, but is there harm done? How long do seniors have to wait? I am really torn on this.
I think that we need better plans. We need actions that are going to be taken. We need to make sure that there is support in place for people as they age so that they can have dignity. I think of my own mother, who is in a long-term care facility. She was a young senior and had a massive stroke. Her whole life changed in a day and our whole family had to change to accommodate that. I see her all the time. She has a decent pension. She was a nurse most of her life and has provided services to the communities that she served. She struggles to make ends meet.
This is assisted living. If she has a bad month, which means she cannot go downstairs and eat the food they provide for her, she has to pay a lot of extra money to have it come up to her. She does not have that money. It gets harder and harder.
I also think about the fact that seniors are starting to lose their well-being because they cannot afford to make ends meet. It impacts one's health, if one cannot afford to make ends meet. We look at the spectrum of seniors as they age. We know that some are doing very well. We know that some are really struggling. We know there are a lot in the middle who sometimes have a good year and sometimes have a very bad year.
There are a lot of solutions that could be provided that would really make some meaningful changes. I think of a bill that I brought to the House that talked about seniors who receive the guaranteed income supplement every year. We know that between 20,000 to 30,000 seniors every year lose their GIS for up to three or four months. Why do they lose it? They lose it because they do not get their taxes in on time. Do they get their taxes on time? Absolutely, they do, every year. However, for many reasons, such as their health, that they are caring for a loved one and they are elderly or the onset of dementia, they do not get their taxes in on time and that means on July 1, they lose their GIS for up to four months.
It was a simple bill that said let us just make sure that every senior across the country who receives the guaranteed income supplement gets a year of grace to get their taxes in so that no senior has to go through months without that extra bit.
I will never forget, my first summer as a member of Parliament, getting that call from a lovely woman who was 84 years old who had lost her GIS. The government said, yes, it was going to get that in place as soon as possible, but her landlord said that, since she could not pay the rent, she had to get out. She was 84 years old. Where she was going to go? We worked really hard to make sure that did not happen, but it does not seem right.
I want to see a bill that is actually going to take action, that is going to make sure that seniors are at the very core of it and that we do not just have another report on a shelf somewhere telling us what we should do while seniors suffer across the country.
I regret to say that I am not sure I will be supporting this, and that the NDP is not sure it will be supporting this. How many reports do we need on a shelf, when we urgently need substantive action for seniors across the country now?
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