- Member of Parliament
- Member of Parliament
- NDP
- Victoria
- British Columbia
- Voting Attendance: 61%
- Expenses Last Quarter: $127,392.53
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- Sep/27/22 11:37:16 a.m.
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Madam Speaker, I will be splitting my time with the member for Rosemont—La Petite-Patrie.
People are struggling with the cost of living. They are struggling with rising inflation. They are struggling to pay for gas, groceries and housing. They are worried about their future and are worried about the future of the planet. They are doing everything right, yet they are struggling to afford basic necessities while billionaires and big corporations are getting richer than ever.
The cost-of-living crisis and rising inflation are being driven by corporate greed. Corporate profits are rising twice as fast as inflation, and as said a number of times today, wages are rising only half as fast. Neither the Conservatives nor the Liberals want to acknowledge the fact that big corporations are benefiting from this crisis and that big corporations are using this crisis as an opportunity to raise prices beyond their increased costs. They are making massive profits while families are hurting.
The Conservatives want to inflame the anger and frustration. They applaud when we talk about Canadians struggling and massive corporations making record profits. Canadians are rightly frustrated and angry, but the Conservatives fail to provide solutions that would actually make a difference in people's lives. They do not want to address the fact that big oil companies are making record profits off the backs of Canadians.
When the New Democrats called for a tax on the excess profits of huge corporations to help make life more affordable, both the Conservatives and the Liberals voted no. The New Democrats believe we need solutions to deal with the cost-of-living crisis that actually support families and workers.
Cutting the price on pollution will not help Canadian families struggling with the cost of living. In fact, the vast majority of Canadians get more money back in rebates than they pay at the pumps. Those with the lowest incomes get the most back, so no, cutting the price on carbon will not help working people. It will only help big oil pad its bottom line and delay climate action.
With the increasing intensity of extreme weather, climate fires and floods, Canadians know we cannot afford to back down in our fight against the climate crisis. Report after report shows that having mitigation and adaptation now is far less expensive than paying for rebuilding infrastructure that has been destroyed or dealing with the aftermath of climate fires, flooding and hurricanes. More than that, it also saves people's lives.
The Leader of the Opposition and the Conservatives may not believe in fighting the climate crisis, but Canadians know better and expect their government to take action. While the New Democrats support a price on pollution, it is not a silver bullet. The Liberals have not been taking the action that matches the urgency or scale of the crisis we are facing, and they continue to let big polluters off the hook.
Carbon pricing must be fairer. The New Democrats would roll back loopholes the Liberals have given to the biggest polluters and make them pay their fair share. Both the Conservatives and the Liberals need to stop standing up for corporate interests and start standing up for working people.
We are calling for a tax on the excess profits of big oil to help make life more affordable while fighting the climate crisis. Big oil is benefiting while working families are hurting. Canadian oil and gas companies are forecast to rake in a record $147 billion this year. It is hard to even imagine what that number means. That is $147 billion just this year, but instead of investing these record profits in promised emissions reductions to clean up their own pollution or even investing to create good jobs for workers in clean energy, oil and gas companies are paying out huge dividends to their rich shareholders.
Amazingly, at the very same time, oil and gas CEOs are lining their pockets and delaying climate action. They have the audacity to tell the government they need more time and more subsidies to meet the Liberals' already weak climate targets. At a time when oil and gas companies are making more money than ever, it is unacceptable that they are not paying to clean up their own mess and are instead begging for more corporate handouts. However, it is not surprising, because the Liberals have been giving billions of dollars each year to these big oil and gas companies. This is nothing more than corporate greed.
The New Democrats have asked and will continue to push the Liberals to do something to take on this corporate greed, but both the Liberals and the Conservatives have said no. They said no to making CEOs pay what they owe. They said no to making sure the wealthiest corporations pay their fair share. They are fine with the ultrarich getting richer and richer while workers continue to struggle to make ends meet.
Solutions to deal with the rising cost of living should not put further burden on the shoulders of families. Big corporations and wealthy CEOs should not be getting away without paying their fair share. The New Democrats support putting a price on pollution, but the Liberals' carbon pricing system continues to let big polluters off the hook. Under their flawed system, Canada's biggest polluters pay the lowest carbon tax rate. Loopholes mean that oil and gas companies only pay a tiny fraction of the cost of their pollution, as 80% to 90% of their emissions are exempt. Suncor only pays one-fourteenth of the full carbon price. These loopholes need to be closed so that big oil pays what it owes for its pollution.
While a price on pollution is important, it is not nearly enough. The Liberals have continued to fail when it comes to meeting the urgency of this crisis. Instead of expecting the carbon tax to be a silver bullet, the Liberals need to make bold investments in clean energy, in energy-efficiency homes and buildings and in public transit. The Liberals need a real plan that supports workers and creates jobs in communities across Canada. They need to stop giving billions in subsidies to oil and gas companies, the same companies that are profiting off the backs of Canadians.
We need solutions to deal with the cost of living that actually support families, that help workers, that make life more affordable and that do not put further burden on the shoulders of families. The Conservatives believe people should be left to fend for themselves while billionaires reap the benefits. Then there are the Liberals, who are so far out of touch with the reality of working families that they need to be forced to act. When it comes to climate change, they like to say all the right things but then fail to do the right things.
We know the support that Canadians are getting right now is not enough. Families are still hurting while oil and gas companies are getting richer and richer. We will continue to call on the Liberals to put in place an excess profits tax on oil and gas companies to provide relief for struggling Canadians.
Last week, the UN Secretary-General called on countries to implement a windfall profits tax on fossil-fuel companies, saying, “Polluters must pay.” The Conservative government in the U.K. has already put a 25% windfall tax on oil and gas profits. The EU has announced plans for a tax on windfall profits. Spain, Greece, Italy, Hungary, Romania and Bulgaria have all implemented a similar levy. It is shameful that the Liberals have so far refused to make big polluters pay their fair share.
Last week, the Minister of Environment appeared to change his tune, saying he is not against a windfall tax but that he is waiting on oil and gas companies to show their commitment to climate action. It is clear this is a fantasy being sold by the environment minister and the oil and gas lobby. A new report from The Pembina Institute shows that oil and gas companies are paying out huge dividends to their shareholders instead of investing in climate solutions.
While the Liberals and the Conservatives are more interested in helping corporations maximize their profits, the New Democrats will continue to fight for Canadians, workers and communities. We need climate action and we need it now.
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- Mar/21/22 1:40:49 p.m.
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Mr. Speaker, I will be splitting my time with the member for Nanaimo—Ladysmith.
The cost of food is going up. The cost of gas is going up. The cost of housing has been skyrocketing for years, and it continues to shoot up. Canadians are feeling the impacts. They are struggling to make ends meet and to put food on the table, struggling to pay rent and struggling just to afford the basics.
While Canadians are struggling, big corporations are making record profits. In my riding of Victoria, seniors on fixed incomes are coming to me saying that the rising costs mean they are having to choose between paying for food and paying for medication. Families who have been surviving paycheque to paycheque have told me they are going into debt just to get by. Many young people are barely scraping by as it is. Most have completely given up on the idea of ever owning a home and are just worried about how they are going to pay rent.
I sat down with the James Bay Community Project a few weeks ago. They are an amazing non-profit community organization. They help seniors, youth and families by providing community support and volunteer services.
They spoke to me about the impact that the pandemic has had on low-income folks in our community, especially in food insecurity for seniors. The rising cost of living impacts everyone, but it especially impacts the most vulnerable. While people in my community and people across Canada are struggling, the ultra-rich are making more money than ever, raking in record profits and accumulating even more wealth.
Wealth inequality is reaching levels that we have not seen in generations. The past year broke records when it came to creating new billionaires. On average, a new billionaire was created every day—every single day. The number of billionaires on the Forbes annual list of the world's wealthiest exploded to unprecedented levels. The wealth of billionaires has risen more in the past two years during this pandemic than it has in the past 14 years. This is the biggest surge in billionaire wealth since we started keeping records, and a staggering 90% of the Canadian billionaires are richer than they were one year ago.
While everyday Canadians are falling farther and farther behind, worried about the cost of food and worried about the cost of rent, the super-rich are getting even richer. This kind of extreme inequality is outrageous in and of itself.
I spoke to a single mom who told me about how the rising cost of gas, diapers and food has eaten into her budget and how she is scrambling this year, on the first of every month, calling friends and trying to figure out how she is going to make rent, while at the same time, in the same year, the wealthiest shareholders and corporations, the same corporations that are raising prices, are raking in billions. That is outrageous. The members in this chamber should be outraged.
It is outrageous that while families are struggling to pay for groceries, the billionaire Weston family is raking in profits. They own Loblaws, the Real Canadian Superstore and Shoppers Drug Mart. Loblaws has a net profit of more than a billion dollars. As the price of groceries continues to increase, Loblaws paid out half a billion dollars in dividends to their shareholders. Families are struggling to pay for gas, but Suncor made over $4 billion. Gas prices continue to rise, and they paid out $3.9 billion to their shareholders. Oil companies are making record profits off the backs of Canadians, while Canadians are paying hundreds of dollars more at the pump. At the same time, these oil companies are receiving billions in fossil fuel subsidies from the Liberal government.
It is outrageous that the government continues to hand out public money to profitable oil companies, companies that are fuelling the climate crisis. The climate crisis is already threatening everything that we value, with devastating climate fires, extreme flooding and extreme heat.
The Arctic poles are currently experiencing unprecedented heat waves. This is causing alarm among climate scientists. This is a dire warning of a faster and more abrupt climate breakdown. How many more dire warnings do we need? How many more disasters? We are running out of time to stop the worst and irreversible impacts of the climate crisis.
This is a climate emergency, and the government is not acting like it, continuing to pay big oil to pollute while it gouges Canadians at the pump. That is outrageous. Families are struggling to make mortgage and loan payments while Scotiabank had a net profit of over $10 billion. It had the gall to increase fees for customers while paying out $4.3 billion in dividends to its shareholders. That is outrageous.
The economic impacts of the pandemic hit Canadians hard. As families, seniors and young people have struggled with the cost of living, corporations that have been raising prices are making windfall profits. This kind of extreme inequality is outrageous. However, extreme inequality is not only outrageous; it leads to worse health and social outcomes and has a disproportionate impact on women and racialized folks. It also puts a drag on economic growth.
Importantly, and this is probably the most important thing I am going to say today, this kind of extreme inequality is not inevitable. It is not a fact of life. It is a choice by decision-makers, by elected officials, by the government. It is a choice to protect the profits of the wealthiest while making the vast majority suffer the consequences. Because of choices made by the government, the ultrarich can continue to protect their wealth using a financial system with very little transparency. Because of choices made by the government, the wealthiest are allowed to exploit this crisis for their own profit. They benefit from excess corporate profits while everyday Canadians get gouged by inflation.
Because of choices of the government, money laundering and tax evasion are rampant in Canada, driving up the cost of housing. There is even a name for it: “snow washing”. It refers to how easy it is in Canada to launder money and evade taxes. We have some of the weakest corporate transparency laws in the world. This allows billions to be laundered, and it has been devastating our real estate market. It has led to an overvaluing of the average price of residential properties. On average, it impacts homes in my riding of Victoria by $45,000 to $90,000. This is why we need a publicly accessible beneficial ownership registry.
Housing, grocery and gas prices are the rising costs that people are dealing with every day, so today, members of the House have a choice. Are we going to make big banks, big box stores and big oil companies pay their fair share? Are we going to help the people who are struggling with the cost of living? Are we going to get tough on money laundering and tax evasion?
The Liberal government has the choice today to stop protecting excess corporate profits and to start helping people with the cost of living. One important step would be fulfilling their campaign promise to implement a 3% surtax on banks and insurance companies with net profits of over $1 billion, and extend the surtax to oil companies and large grocery chains. It is also critical to establish a publicly accessible beneficial ownership registry to combat tax evasion and money laundering by the wealthy. Then, let us choose to use the tax revenue from the surtax to fund things that will actually help people who are struggling with the cost-of-living crisis. Let us increase the Canada child benefit, the GIS and GST rebates, and build affordable housing. Fair taxation is a key tool for governments to address wealth inequality, provide key public services and increase supports that curb inequality.
When members of the House vote on this motion—
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