- Member of Parliament
- Member of Parliament
- Conservative
- Cumberland—Colchester
- Nova Scotia
- Voting Attendance: 67%
- Expenses Last Quarter: $134,737.37
- Government Page
- May/22/24 5:13:34 p.m.
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Mr. Speaker, I think part of the difficulty is that the costly coalition fails to recognize that their continued spending on behalf of Canadians is costing Canadian lives. We know that, under the health care system that exists under the government's watch, between 17,000 and 30,000 Canadians die every year because of a procedure or a consultation they cannot get. The government still continues to spend money in a hand-over-fist fashion. With the support of the costly coalition partners behind me, what we are seeing is another bill being rushed through, much like the botched dental care plan, which we know should have taken several years and is now failing Canadians.
The other misconception that the government wants to peddle to Canadians is that this is a free plan that already exists. We already know there is no plan. This is a simple pamphlet or idea, again for photo ops, that is going to cost Canadians money. The minister spoke already about how the government is going to set up a specialist committee to talk about it a bit more. After that, it is going to create another Canadian drug agency, which is going to cost hundreds of thousands of dollars every year.
What we need is a responsible government. Whenever the Liberals are ready to allow us to take over, we are more than happy to.
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- Nov/20/23 2:13:14 p.m.
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Mr. Speaker, in Cumberland—Colchester, the roster for visits to the local food bank is 1,800 people. Across the country, two million Canadians visit a food bank every month. After eight years, the Prime Minister is not worth the cost.
Under the NDP-Liberal coalition government, Canadians have seen housing costs double and mortgage payments have increased by 150%. The Prime Minister is not worth the cost.
Canadians are reaching out to all our offices in record numbers whether to bemoan the fact that they have been priced out of their lives by the punishing carbon tax or to convey that they are afraid to walk their local streets at night due to violent crime being increased by 39% under the NDP-Liberal government.
The $600 billion in inflationary spending and countless tax hikes by the NDP-Liberals has led to Canadians being unable to feed themselves, house themselves and to keep the heat on.
Therefore, common-sense Conservatives will demand three things in the government's mini budget: cancel the plan to quadruple the carbon tax; bring down inflation and interest rates by balancing the budget; and, finally, build homes not bureaucracy.
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- Jun/7/23 2:16:29 p.m.
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Mr. Speaker, the Liberal government’s out-of-control spending leaves Canadians with the grim reality that money is tighter in their households every month. People in Cumberland—Colchester have contacted me almost daily to express hopelessness and dismay as they watch prices and interest rates climb. Today’s interest rate hike and its effect on mortgages will be disastrous.
The hard work by Nova Scotians for the betterment of the country has been rewarded with eight years of ridiculous inflationary spending, culminating, sadly, in the terrible budget we see before the House now. The Liberals have now approved $60 billion in new inflationary spending, more weight on the backs of Canadian families and businesses. These are people with hopes and dreams that cannot be achieved because of the Liberals' out-of-control spending.
The madness needs to stop now. The Liberals must give us a plan to end the inflationary deficits and spending in order to bring down inflation and interest rates so Canadians can thrive in this country again.
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- May/18/23 4:24:04 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, I thank the great member for South Surrey—White Rock for such an interesting speech, and for taking a very complex subject and making it understandable for all Canadians.
Can the member comment briefly on the wisdom of spending $3.5 million in taxpayer money on these vending machines, three of which are in Vancouver and one in Victoria, her home province, and increasing access to powerful opioid-type medications?
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- Mar/28/23 3:03:01 p.m.
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Mr. Speaker, at a time when Canadians are facing being caught in the vice of a cost-of-living crisis, the current Liberal government has done nothing but crank the handle. Rather than merely being content with raising the carbon tax, the tax on everything, the government is still spending millions upon millions of dollars on outside management consultants, and I have been schooled on being careful about that. There is something broken when the current Liberals cannot seem to understand that the spending is an inflationary dollar upon dollar. Why is the Prime Minister more focused on helping his high-priced Liberal consultants than on helping everyday Canadians?
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Madam Speaker, I thank you for that astute advice. I really appreciate it.
This article said, “because mental health should be a priority.” That is the article I am quoting, which has the Prime Minister's name. It is important that Canadians understand that.
“But despite the sense of urgency in [the Prime Minister's] remarks last year,” and I have changed that word to satisfy the chamber, because we all know who the Liberal Prime Minister is, “no money has yet materialized for this new Canada mental health transfer”.
I am going to say that again, just to make sure that everybody has heard it. No money has yet materialized, “including an initial $875 million that was supposed to have been spent or budgeted by now, according to the Liberal party’s 2021 election platform.”
“The Liberal platform document included a line-by-line costing of all its election promises, and it outlined a promise to spend $250 million in 2021-22 on the new mental health transfer, and then $625 million in the current 2022-23 fiscal year, with additional amounts over the next three years adding up to $4.5 billion total.”
“None of the promised spending over the last two fiscal years has yet been allocated or spent.”
To me, that is important. Again, I will quote from the Liberal Prime Minister, “because mental health should be a priority.”
Where is the priority of mental health, and why is it not materializing?
We know that my hon. colleague, who spoke just before me, talked incessantly about a three-digit suicide prevention hotline, which was harder than giving birth to a baby elephant to make it happen. It is absolutely shocking to think about how the government wants to talk about being helpful to Canadians and how it has their proverbial backs, etc. I just do not see that. That is absolutely atrocious.
This article goes on to talk about the national director of public policy for the Canadian Mental Health Association, and they pointed out that the “April budget contained no money earmarked for this new transfer.”
“Let’s be clear, for it not to be in Budget 2022, at least with a timeline of ramp up to the $4.5 (billion), you know, it was really concerning to us.” That was stated by the Canadian Mental Health Association.
After eight years, why does the government continue to fail Canadians? That would be a great question to know the answer to.
We also heard in the health committee last week that counsellors and psychotherapists are required to charge GST on their services. We know that, sadly, many Canadians do not have private coverage for those services, but to add insult to injury, to pour salt in a wound, what we are now requiring is for Canadians to pay GST on those services. How does that make any sense?
It goes on to say that, “psychiatrists across the country [are] 'incredibly concerned' about patients needing better access to care, including addiction services”. These are addiction services that the government would tout are a whole other kettle of fish and are quite shocking.
There is still controversy around providing medical assistance in dying for people with mental disorders among providers. Obviously, one of the other things that I think is very important is the fact that the government has not transferred any, zero, nada, zilch, of the $4.5 billion. Think of my riding of Cumberland—Colchester and the difficulties that rural Canadians are suffering.
Because of their geography, rural Canadians are struggling not only to get access to mental health, but also to put gas in their cars to get them to the actual appointments. The punishing carbon tax that the government wants to put on everything in this country is really affecting their ability to have the money to pay the extra GST required for counselling and psychotherapy.
We all know that if people are struggling to put food on the table, and if Canadians have to choose between eating and looking after their mental health, they are likely going to choose eating. This is a sad commentary on life in Canada where it appears that everything is broken. The sad commentary will continue in this country because of the punishing taxes the government wants to continue levying on Canadians, which is making life unaffordable.
We know the crisis in mental health is going to continue. It would appear that approximately one in three Canadians is struggling with their mental health. We know that the government has put out its own projections to say, if we read the report on departmental results, it would expect that 22% of Canadians would not be able to access mental health care, and the actual result is 25% of Canadians cannot access mental health care. This is unacceptable. Zero percent of Canadians should have this issue, and we have a government that thinks 25% is acceptable.
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- Feb/6/23 3:05:04 p.m.
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Mr. Speaker, I am very thankful for that response, because we do have an ideology on this side. That is to stand up for Canadians.
After eight years of spending, the Liberal government is out of money and Canadians are out of patience. Let me cite a few examples of the Liberals' crazy spending: $2 billion to a company that does not even exist, $100 million to the Liberal friends and of course to the Liberals' buddies at McKinsey, and also up to $750 million to a company that is now going out of business and shutting its doors. When will the government stop spending and give Canadians a chance to thrive?
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- Feb/6/23 3:03:52 p.m.
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Mr. Speaker, it is astonishing to think that we are going to lose $750 million and we should be accomplices to that. It is shocking.
Clearly, the government has become dependent on outside spin doctors for new ideas because, guess what, it does not have any of its own. It is exhausted and hopefully it has given up. Who is paying the price for all the Liberals' foolishness? Canadians are. There has been $104.7 million spent on contracts gifted to McKinsey, all because the Liberal government cannot be bothered to do its own work. When can Canadian people expect a full accounting for this ridiculous spending?
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Madam Speaker, it reminds of the theory of everything when we look at this. As the learned member correctly points out, this is the tax on everything in the sense that everything goes up. We know very clearly from some of the comments from my home province of Nova Scotia that businesses will need to begin to pass on the cost of doing business to consumers.
The government would like people to believe that they will end up with more money in their pockets, that somehow the left hand pulls it out and it gets into the right hand, and there is actually more there. I feel like I am in Las Vegas and there is a magic show afoot. I wish I had the money to go there, but clearly with this tax-and-spend government, it is impossible to do so.
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Madam Speaker, I thank my colleague for that important question.
I know very clearly that the Canada health transfers have been a difficulty for all provinces. We see the burgeoning costs of health care, and we know that this is a significant issue. Part of the argument I would make is to ask this. Why are we spending money on more and new programs that are exceedingly expensive, as I said, on the order of $10 billion, when we are continuing to underfund the Canada health transfers at the current time?
It is that old question of robbing Peter to pay Paul. Why are we doing this? Why are we taking money that we do not have and trying to pull it out of this pocket and do a little hocus-pocus to say that we have found some more money?
We are continuing to print money. We know it is adding, as I said previously, fuel to the inflationary fire. We know Canadians find it very important to have a robust and accessible health system, which at the current time they do not have. That is the travesty of the Liberal government.
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- Apr/8/22 11:43:53 a.m.
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Mr. Speaker, every day I get calls about the cost-of-living crisis that Canadians are undergoing. They have raised concerns about the price of chicken, beef, bacon, milk, coffee, sugar, maple syrup, fresh vegetables, fresh fruit, ice cream and potato chips. The list goes on: heating fuel, gasoline, electricity, cellphone bills, home repairs, clothing, alcohol, beer, wine and of course the price of a home. We know the price of everything is increasing at a pace that is much greater than their paycheques.
When will the spend-DP-Liberals admit they are failing Canadians, which leaves them falling further and further behind?
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