SoVote

Context: House Hansard - 172 - Mar/23/23

Mar/23/23 10:41:19 a.m.
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Madam Speaker, let us try this again. I believe, just for confirmation, that I have 19 minutes left in my comments.

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The Assistant Deputy Speaker (Mrs. Carol Hughes)

Mar/23/23 10:41:29 a.m.
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I do want to remind the member that his time is not being eaten away by these points of order. The clock is stopped every time.

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Mr. Luc Berthold (Mégantic—L'Érable, CPC)

Mar/23/23 10:41:36 a.m.
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Madam Speaker, I think that the point we are discussing right now is extremely important. You just indicated that we may not refer to the presence or the absence of specific MPs in the House. I would like to have some clarification from you and from the Table. For example, if I say that a significant number of Liberals are not in the House right now, am I making a faux pas in the House? It is essential that I get an answer to this question.

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The Assistant Deputy Speaker (Mrs. Carol Hughes)

Mar/23/23 10:42:02 a.m.
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I thank the member. I will consider the question and come back to the House with an answer shortly.

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Mr. Kevin Lamoureux (Parliamentary Secretary to the Leader of the Government in the House of Commons, Lib.)

Mar/23/23 10:42:12 a.m.
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Madam Speaker, let me switch a bit, because the Conservatives are a little sensitive on the issue of accountability and responding to questions being posed to them. We witnessed that last night. Having said that, let me assure those who are going to be following the debate today, first and foremost the many individuals who are interested in the whole issue of cybersecurity, that we will get to that debate eventually. It is just that the Conservatives have chosen to play a bit of a game. Fortunately, it is an area I really enjoy talking about, because it is an issue that is so important to all Canadians, and that is the budgetary measures the government has to put into place in order to ensure the economy is working for all of us. Since we formed government back in 2015, we have had a very clear and concise message as a government. This is a government focused on supporting Canada's middle class and those aspiring to become a part of it. This is a government that has been there to have the backs of Canadians during a worldwide pandemic. This is a government that has recognized the need for the government to take actions, even at a time when we have inflation rates that are not acceptable. Members opposite will talk about inflation and they will give a false impression. If we listened to what the Conservative Party is saying, we would think this government is the cause of worldwide inflation. One member says it is. We are not quite that influential around the world; I can assure the member of that. At the end of the day, if we take a look at Canada's inflation rate, we can compare it to the countries of the G7 or even the G20, our allied countries. We can look at it in terms of the United States. We will find that our inflation rate is actually lower than the U.S.A.'s and than that of most countries in Europe, whether France or others. Our inflation rate is still of concern to the government, because we understand. As members of Parliament, we go home and understand the pains our constituents are experiencing, and that is the reason we take seriously the issue of consultations, something Stephen Harper really did not do. In fact, we have a Prime Minister who still does open, public town hall-type meetings, something the former Prime Minister never really did. We have a Minister of Finance in the department who aggressively goes out to consult with Canadians and different stakeholders consistently throughout the year, but in particular in the lead-up to making those important budgetary decisions. We do this because we recognize how important it is, as a government, that our budget reflect what Canadians expect the government to do. Yesterday, the Conservatives wanted to focus on one aspect. They wanted to talk about the possibility of 15¢ for 24 bottles of beer and the impact that was going to have on Canadian society. That is what their focus was yesterday. Mr. James Bezan: Jobs. What about the agriculture sector? Mr. Kevin Lamoureux: Madam Speaker, the member says “jobs”—

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The Assistant Deputy Speaker (Mrs. Carol Hughes)

Mar/23/23 10:46:11 a.m.
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Order. I just want to remind the member that he should stick to his speech and not answer during the debate when other people are yelling out. I would also ask members not to yell out, mention other things or try to have conversations with the hon. member. Again, I would ask members to hold on to their questions and comments. They will have 10 minutes of questions and comments. The hon. member still has almost 14 minutes to speak, so I would ask individual members to please be mindful of that. The hon. parliamentary secretary.

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Mr. Kevin Lamoureux

Mar/23/23 10:46:43 a.m.
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Madam Speaker, the point was that the Conservatives could have talked about what the member just heckled about, which is jobs. We could have talked about jobs yesterday. Does the member not realize the number of jobs that have been added to Canada's economy since before the pandemic got under way? We have seen an increase of over 830,000 jobs, closer to a million. Can members imagine that? It took Stephen Harper 10 years to achieve a million jobs. We went through a pandemic, and because we had the right priorities, unlike the Conservatives, we protected Canadians. We were there to support small businesses. Never before have we seen the type of programs that supported small businesses, whether it was with loans or wage subsidies. Millions of jobs were saved as a direct result of that. Companies were prevented from going bankrupt in many situations because of that. We were able to support Canadians through the CERB program. Imagine the eight million-plus Canadians who genuinely needed the program, which allowed them to put food on the table, pay their mortgage and so forth. By providing those types of supports, we were in a good position to rebound and build stronger after the crux of the pandemic. As a result, there are more than 830,000 more jobs today than there were at the beginning of the pandemic. This is far better than, let us say, the United States or some other countries in the world. Why is that? It is because the federal government chose to work with Canadians, chose to work with different levels of government, and implemented policies that really made the difference. If I were to cite some of those policies today, we hear Conservatives talk about their Conservative ideas. There are a few that come to mind, some that we put in place and some that the Conservatives wished they could have put into place. We go out and consult. What does the leader of the Conservative Party do? He says that consultation is not necessary. After all, we have YouTube. Remember cryptocurrency, which was economics 101 and his first major policy statement recommendation for Canadians? The Conservative Party of Canada was saying that the way we avoid inflation and really reap the profits was to invest in cryptocurrency. This is something he advised Canadians to do. I will conclude with those who took the advice of the Conservative leader. They had their savings wiped out, with 60% to 70% gone. It was incredible the amount of money that was lost on cryptocurrency, going into the millions of dollars. Individuals on a fixed income who believed what the Conservative leader was saying paid a very heavy price. Now the Conservatives are talking about interest rates. Do members remember what the leader of the Conservative Party said about the Bank of Canada? He said that we would fire or get rid of the head of the Bank of Canada. An hon. member: Why would he do that? Mr. Kevin Lamoureux: Madam Speaker, that is a very good question. Why would he do that? This is also what the member for Abbotsford posed, and look what happened to that member. I will reference the member and the riding he is from who questioned the Conservative leader's judgment on that issue because the member for Abbotsford now sits way in the back and has been kind of ditched to the side. We very rarely hear from him. However, we have an initiative or suggestion from the leader of the Conservative Party that even progressive Conservatives disagree with. We need to look at some of the other issues. Let us stop with some of the Conservative ideas because they can be painful to listen to. We can think of the child care program. What is the Conservative Party's position on child care? We know that during the election they said they would rip it up. They did not want anything to do with the Liberal plan. Now, because the government had the support of at least one opposition party, we were able to implement a national child care program, $10-a-day day care, throughout the country. Every province, even Doug Ford's Ontario, has signed onto the program. The economic impact of that program will see more people participating in the workforce. There will be more recognition of quality child care. Universally, with the exception of the Conservative Party of Canada, it has been well received. I am hoping that sometime between now and the next federal election we will see a major flip-flop by the Conservative Party on this issue. I hope it will not rip up the agreements and will continue the commitment, because we have seen the success of that particular program. All one needs to do is look at the province of Quebec and the positive impact it has had on that province, particularly women becoming engaged in the workforce as a direct result. That is an idea that really makes a difference. Speaking of flip-flops, my colleague from Lanark—Frontenac—Kingston referred to the price on pollution. We really have to follow the bouncing ball on that one. Representatives from around the world went to Paris where there was a great deal of discussion about what we can do about the environment. They recognized that climate change is real. Climate change is a reality of life on earth today. There are some in the Conservative Party who do not quite understand that, or choose to not believe it is a reality, but it is a reality. From that Paris conference came the idea that we needed to implement a national price on pollution. Some provinces, indirectly or in some other way, had it, so we said we were going to put in a policy to protect the environment, via a backstop to make sure that all of the provinces and territories have it. The price on pollution is quickly becoming the go-to tool for ensuring that Canadians are participating in diminishing greenhouse gases. Other provinces have now opted into the price on pollution because, as the Parliamentary Budget Officer has made very clear, there is a net benefit for the majority of Canadians with the federal backstop program on the price on pollution. That is a really positive thing. The Conservatives, prior to the last election, were opposed to it. They fought it tooth and nail. Then they had a new leader, about two or three leaders ago, and the new leader said that a price on pollution is a good thing. They came up with a different type of design so they could stamp it blue to put it in their campaign. There were 338 Conservative candidates from coast to coast to coast saying they supported a price on pollution, and they got a lot of votes based on that, a lot of votes. A lot of people thought that maybe the Conservatives could be sensitive to the environment. After the election, a new, shiny leader took over and that idea was gone. It was history. It was toast. Now the Conservative Party says not to worry about climate change because, after all, we do not need a price on pollution. It wanted to get rid of it. Getting rid of the price on pollution will be a platform issue, no doubt, coming from the Conservative Party of Canada. They will spread all sorts of misinformation. They will attempt to give the false impression that most people are not going to receive, or have not been receiving, a net benefit. They have been talking a lot about doctors and health care workers. The government of Canada has been working with different levels of government to ensure that we can get more credentials recognized. We have been providing incentives for that to take place and looking at ways in which immigration itself could assist. We know and we realize that we want to see an enhancement of health care workers. The Conservatives came up with this next idea about having a common national test. Members can imagine what they are telling Canadians. They are saying to Canadians that they are going to get them more doctors. The way they are going to do it is to have an exam so that someone coming into Canada, or any doctor, I would assume, could write this exam and then go to any province or territory to be a doctor. That is balderdash. A federal Conservative government in the future, heaven forbid, could not do what it is that they are talking about doing. The administration of health care is done through provinces. There are professional organizations and all sorts of stakeholders out there. It is not as simple as saying that we are going to have a national exam and if someone passes that national exam then they are going to be able to practice medicine. When do they think they would be able to implement something of that nature? I think that they are looking at this and thinking they will hoodwink Canadians on this, much like they have tried to trick them on other issues. In the last 20-plus years of its history, the Conservative Party has never demonstrated an interest in health care. What we negotiated back in the 2004 health care accord, was expired by the Conservatives. They are the ones who reduced it from 6% to 3%. They had no interest in meeting federal and provincial first ministerial meetings to deal with the health care issue. One of the first things did, whether in previous administrations or this administration, has been to invest in health care. We achieved health care accord agreements with individual provinces shortly after. We have just invested $198 billion in health care. Health care is a part of our core identity as Canadians, and we have made the investment, recognizing that those are the types of priorities Canadians have. That is what this Liberal caucus is reflecting on: the priorities of Canadians. The good news is that next week we are going to have a federal budget that will amplify what it is that Canadians expect of the government. I look forward to seeing that budget and being able to participate in that debate.

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Mr. Yves Perron (Berthier—Maskinongé, BQ)

Mar/23/23 11:00:17 a.m.
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Madam Speaker, I will bring the debate back to budget requests. The earlier exchanges were not very respectful. I would like my colleague to speak about the agriculture sector and agri-food processing. Agricultural groups informed the government that they were expecting significant support to deal with inflation, especially newer businesses. Next-generation businesses currently have very high debt levels. They need some liquidity. Does my colleague agree that those sectors need support? Has he supported the creation of such measures within his party? We have to help the next generation. We also need an innovation program to improve agri-food processing, which is affected by a significant and very serious delay in infrastructure investment. We must not wait for it to be more profitable for a multinational to demolish a building and put up a new one because we do not know where the new one will be built. It is important that the government provide assistance for that. I would like to hear my colleague's reaction to that.

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Mr. Kevin Lamoureux

Mar/23/23 11:01:22 a.m.
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Madam Speaker, our agricultural industries throughout the country are of critical importance. When the member talks about infrastructure, there is no government that has invested more in infrastructure, at least in the last 50, 60 or 70 years, than this government has over the last five, six or seven years. In agriculture, of course it is important. We have to be careful when we talk about interest rates or inflation. Let us do a fair comparison. Take a look at what is happening in the United States. Take a look at what is happening in the G20 countries. To say that interest rates in Canada are going up and that we are not comfortable with the inflation rate in Canada, yes, the government is aware of that. We are taking action. In relative comparison to other jurisdictions, we are doing well, but that is still not good enough. That is the reason why someone such as myself, being from the Prairies, looks at agriculture and the diversity of agriculture. I am very proud of how the pork industry, for example, has grown. I will add comments as—

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The Assistant Deputy Speaker (Mrs. Carol Hughes)

Mar/23/23 11:02:25 a.m.
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Questions and comments: the hon. member for Red Deer—Mountain View.

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Mr. Earl Dreeshen (Red Deer—Mountain View, CPC)

Mar/23/23 11:02:30 a.m.
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Madam Speaker, it is always interesting to listen to my colleague. There are two things. One thing he just mentioned was interest rates and inflation. Right now, Alberta has a 3.2% inflation rate, whereas we are at 5.2% for the rest of the country. Part of the reason for this is that the province is cutting taxes and making sure people have money in their pockets so they can invest in things that are important. This is something different than what we see in the government, and we start to worry about whether the taxes are going to be increased and make it more difficult. The last point I want to make is about health care, which the member talked about. Could he explain what the Liberal government did in the 1990s, when it slashed the money that was going toward health care?

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Mr. Kevin Lamoureux

Mar/23/23 11:03:26 a.m.
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Madam Speaker, when one thinks about the different fluctuating rates of inflation across the country, one also needs to take a look at natural resources, the provincial GDPs and so forth. All of that has an impact on inflation rates. On the health care issue, I am glad the member brings it up. Jean Chrétien established a clear cash transfer on health care. Prior to that commitment, we were working on a tax point shift that ultimately would have seen Ottawa defunding health care into the future. I was concerned. I was in the Manitoba legislature at the time as a parliamentarian, and there was a great deal of discussion that Ottawa was getting out of health care. Thanks to Jean Chrétien and that particular government, we not only established a very strong presence in health care, but we also continued to grow that through health care agreements and accords to ultimately reach what we have today. That is a $198-billion commitment under this particular administration for health care.

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Ms. Lisa Marie Barron (Nanaimo—Ladysmith, NDP)

Mar/23/23 11:04:24 a.m.
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Madam Speaker, we are all seeing across Canada, and in my riding of Nanaimo—Ladysmith, a growing income gap happening. We see so many people struggling to make ends meet while ultrarich CEOs are making higher and higher excess profits every day. This is a big problem. I do see in here that a majority of parties came together and put together a recommendation I find to be quite good, and I wanted to ask the member about it. It reads: Take steps to close the growing income gap and generate revenue to fund poverty reduction programs by closing tax loopholes and ending the use of low-tax or non-cooperative jurisdictions for tax purposes, taxing extreme wealth, and implementing a tax on excessive profits, including windfalls associated with the pandemic. What are the member's thoughts on this? What is the government doing today to begin implementing this very sound recommendation?

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Mr. Kevin Lamoureux

Mar/23/23 11:05:24 a.m.
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Madam Speaker, in principle I agree with what the member is suggesting. It is one reason the Minister of Finance has in fact put a special tax on bank profits. I want to go back even further than that to the principle of tax fairness. One of the very first things we did back in 2015-16 was to introduce a tax break for Canada's middle class. At the same time, we funded that tax break in good part by putting a special tax on Canada's wealthiest 1%. By the way, opposition parties voted against that, but at the end of the day we were able to implement it. Through those types of policy initiatives of the federal government, we developed and enhanced the Canada child benefit program, which then took money away from millionaires and put it where people needed it the most, such as with the development of child care. Again, this had a very positive outcome and is one of the reasons literally thousands of children have been lifted out of poverty.

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Ms. Elizabeth May (Saanich—Gulf Islands, GP)

Mar/23/23 11:06:27 a.m.
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Madam Speaker, there has been a lot of commentary particularly, from both sides of the House, on Canada's climate record. As a Green, I can also say in a non-partisan way that no government in this country has ever met a single climate target to which we have signed on in legally binding agreements. Neither Stephen Harper nor any Liberal prime minister has done so. Not only have we never hit a target, but we have also never gotten the direction right. Our emissions go up instead of going down. As we look at the budget next week, does my hon. colleague and friend not think it would be good to stop putting billions of dollars into promoting fossil fuel use, cut them altogether and cancel the Trans Mountain pipeline?

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Mr. Kevin Lamoureux

Mar/23/23 11:07:17 a.m.
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Madam Speaker, the leader of the Green Party is in fact consistent, and she would disassemble some of our currently existing pipelines. The government has a responsibility. We made commitments to transition and to net zero by 2050. We have also worked with other governments. For example, with the LNG project, which I know the member does not support, we worked very closely with the provincial NDP government in British Columbia, and we were able to move ahead on LNG. I would like to think that all parties inside this chamber except the Green Party support it. Maybe the Bloc does not support it; my apologies. At the end of the day, we do have a very progressive approach to protecting our environment. The price on pollution is just one example; another is tax incentives for hybrid vehicles.

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Mr. Denis Trudel (Longueuil—Saint-Hubert, BQ)

Mar/23/23 11:08:13 a.m.
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Madam Speaker, Canada ranks last in the G7 when it comes to the average number of housing units per capita. That alone is outrageous. There are currently 45,000 people on waiting lists to get low-cost housing in Quebec. It is shameful and outrageous. I spoke with an economist from the Canada Mortgage and Housing Corporation who initiated a study a few months ago. In Quebec alone, in order to address the two biggest problems, which are affordability and accessibility, 1.1 million housing units would need to be built. The private sector will build 500,000 units over the next 10 years. This means that governments need to step up somehow and build 600,000 units in the next 10 years. Over the past five years, as part of the broader national housing strategy, 35,000 units have been built and 60,000 units have been renovated, for a total of 100,000. We need 60,000 every year. This country needs a Marshall plan to address the housing crisis. When is that going to begin?

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Mr. Kevin Lamoureux

Mar/23/23 11:09:25 a.m.
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Madam Speaker, per capita, Canada is one of the fastest-growing countries in the world. We can look at our population base and find that our population growth is actually incredible compared to that of any other country in the world. This means that more people will be looking for housing. What the member did not include is that the lead on housing is not the national government. The national government plays an important role, but so do the provincial governments and municipalities. The municipalities need to allow and allocate more land for housing developments. Those are zoning requirements. The federal government could provide supports, encouragement and dollars. In the last 30 or 40 years, no government has invested more in housing than the current one. We recognize the need. We are supporting action by other governments. In fact, where we can, we are taking direct action to ensure that the housing stock is not only better maintained but also greener from an environmental perspective. We are also growing the actual number of houses for people with disabilities, as well as non-profit homes, generally speaking.

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The Assistant Deputy Speaker (Mrs. Carol Hughes)

Mar/23/23 11:10:43 a.m.
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Before we move on to the next speaker, I would like to return to the point of order raised by the member for Mégantic-L'Érable. House of Commons Procedure and Practice, third edition, 2017, by Marc Bosc and André Gagnon, on page 619, chapter 13, states the following: Allusions to the presence or absence of a Member or Minister in the Chamber are unacceptable. As we can see, it states, “a Member” and “a Minister in the Chamber”. I would still like to remind members that there is a gray area when we refer to people who are or are not in the House. It would be better not to mention who is in the House and who is not, as a general rule.

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Mr. Gabriel Ste-Marie (Joliette, BQ)

Mar/23/23 11:11:24 a.m.
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Madam Speaker, thank you for those clarifications. It is still a grey area. MPs learn something every day in the House. Crises teach us so much because they subject our societies to pressure. They highlight our strengths and our weaknesses. However, for the past three years, we have been operating from inside a Matryoshka doll set of crises that have revealed weaknesses in both our economic structure and government action. There was the COVID‑19 crisis, lockdowns and a stalled economy. First, let us talk about the public health crisis. The COVID‑19 crisis revealed the system's extreme fragility, aggravated by the aging population. It was primarily caused, however, by chronic federal underfunding, which has escalated since 2017 when health transfers stopped being tied to rising costs. A better division of health care costs, including adequate and predictable federal funding, would have protected our health care system from potential collapse. Moreover, recent agreements are insufficient to stave off that threat. At best, they temporarily freeze, at an insufficient level, the federal share of health care funding, nothing more. In 10 years, Ottawa will contribute 24% of health care costs, which is the same percentage it was contributing when the current Prime Minister took office in 2015. We know that ending the government's disengagement is not enough to rebuild the health care system. The government needs to tackle the chronic underfunding with a significant reinvestment if we have any hope of being able to deal with the coming demographic crisis. Quebec and the Canadian provinces have said it again and again while providing ample evidence to support their case, but Ottawa is missing in action. Ottawa is the one holding on to the money that Quebec and the provinces urgently need on a ongoing basis. COVID-19 created an income crisis for individuals by forcing millions of people to stop working temporarily. It brought to light the flaws in the employment insurance system, which covers only a small portion of the contributors who lose their jobs. Because the system was inadequate, the government was forced to compensate by creating a whole host of special programs, which were often not well-thought-out, poorly targeted, ineffective and costly. However, these programs expired, as did the relaxed EI rules, which are now back to the way they were before 2020 and before COVID showed us how inadequate they were. With the threat of a recession looming, now is the time to fix the problems with the EI system, to make it more accessible and to adapt it to non-standard jobs, which are becoming increasingly common. Ottawa is refusing to conduct this necessary, in-depth reform. After the lockdowns, the economy reopened. This reopening of the economy also revealed its share of weaknesses. The housing shortage, caused by years of underfunding and not building enough homes, caused prices to skyrocket. Housing starts, especially for affordable rental housing and social and co-operative housing are still weak in 2023. Things need to change course and fast. The destabilization of our manufacturing sector made us seriously dependent on foreign suppliers in globalized supply chains, whose fragility was exposed during the crisis. There again, the disruptions led to shortages and high inflation, amplified by a lack of competition, which allowed mass distribution to increase its prices at will. We need to rebuild solid supply chains immediately and improve our competition regime. It is imperative that we improve the resilience of our economy. All these factors contributed to the increase in prices and then the successive interest rate hikes set by the central bank. We know who is suffering the most from this: people on a fixed income, such as pensioners, low-income earners who cannot cope with the increased cost of essentials, and heavily indebted households that are especially hard hit by rising interest rates, especially young families who recently purchased a home. As if that were not enough, we are now being rocked by international crises. Aggression against Ukraine is turning Russia into an international pariah and pushing it out of trade and economic channels. That has impacted the price of commodities, oil, grains and fertilizers, all of which have skyrocketed. In addition to reminding us that we need to urgently reduce our dependency on oil, war is affecting the agricultural sector in particular, where input costs have skyrocketed. That sector urgently needs to be given the tools to survive the crisis, as well as help to adopt a more sustainable model: supply management protection, predictability, resilience to annual yield variability and disasters, ecological transition, standards reciprocity and succession planning, among other things. Then there is China. Its economy is far more diversified than that of Russia, and a rise in tensions is likely to impact many more sectors. In particular, we are completely dependent on China's supply of components needed for high-tech goods and the electrification of transportation. These sectors need a major boost. We already have a relative advantage because Quebec and Canada have critical mineral deposits. If we move from mining to producing batteries, as the government of Quebec is proposing, we will all have what it takes to become the engine of transportation electrification in North America and become a vital link in new and more resilient supply chains. In that area, Ottawa must align with Quebec to accelerate the rolling out of its strategy. Finally, there are crises unfolding in slow motion. There are three crises that we can see coming. They have been anticipated and analyzed for a long time, and there is no reason for not implementing the measures needed to address them. First of all, there are demographic changes. The aging population will put more pressure on health care services and on the public finances of Quebec and the provinces, as we know. As baby boomers retire, this will also have significant economic repercussions. Canada ranks near the bottom of OECD countries when it comes to protecting the purchasing power of retirees. There is an urgent need to preserve seniors' purchasing power to ensure that the demographic shock does not cause a major economic shock, which is why we want an increase in old age security that does not discriminate based on age. This wave of retirements is problematic for businesses. The labour shortage could prevent us from rebuilding our supply chains if we do not take steps to address the shortage. Incentives must be provided for experienced workers who want to stay on the job. Our businesses need to step up their productivity to help them deal with the labour shortage. The temporary foreign worker program must be transferred to Quebec, which will be able to make it more efficient and bring it in line with Quebec's labour policies. Then there is the climate crisis. Again, it has been unfolding for a long time, and we have analyzed it from every angle. However, we have been slow to act. Whether we are talking about shoreline erosion or the increase in extreme weather events, climate change will put enormous pressure on our public infrastructure. An adjustment fund is needed. More fundamentally, we must accelerate the transition to a net-zero economy. The money invested in oil and gas must be urgently redirected to the green economy, with a focus on energy efficiency in all sectors, the electrification of transportation, which includes critical mineral processing, the transition from oil to renewable energy, and more sustainable agricultural practices. As oil companies take advantage of international crises to rake in obscene profits, Ottawa must end all forms of subsidies, including subsidies for carbon sequestration and small nuclear power plants that are designed to produce energy to increase oil sands production. This money must be redirected to accelerating the transition. Given the enormity of the task and the urgent need for action, the financial sector will have to participate and gradually redirect its oil investments to the green economy. Ottawa must get the banks to step up to the plate by forcing them to integrate climate risks into their investments. Tens of billions of dollars could be made available for the green transition. There is the ongoing issue of the fiscal imbalance, which is causing major problems that are limiting the government's ability to address the many challenges it faces. There are three types of problems. First, Ottawa, which brings in more revenue than it needs to discharge its responsibilities, is not making an effort to manage its own affairs properly. The federal government is notoriously ineffective, and everything costs more than it should. I would like to give two examples to illustrate this. It costs the federal government two and a half times more to process an EI claim than it costs the Quebec government to process a social assistance claim. It costs the federal government four times more to issue a passport than it costs the Quebec government to issue a driver's licence. Everything costs more and those are just two examples. Then, Ottawa uses its fiscal room to interfere in areas that fall under the jurisdiction of Quebec and the provinces. This sort of interference makes the sharing of powers less clear and less sound while undermining our autonomy. Administrative duplication is not in any way efficient. All it does is promote centralization in Ottawa. I will again give two examples. The first concerns something that happened very recently, specifically the implementation of the dental care program for children. Quebec already provides dental insurance. However, the federal government did not make any effort to harmonize programs and simply created a second program. That is completely inefficient and ends up costing twice as much. It is really outrageous, and the Bloc Québécois has spoken about that many times. Here is a more general example. People in Quebec have to complete two tax returns when, for years, the Quebec National Assembly and the Bloc Québécois have been calling for a single tax return. That is a useless and inefficient duplication of effort. Lastly, with regard to the fiscal imbalance, given that Ottawa tightly controls the purse strings of the governments of Quebec and the Canadian provinces, the Quebec government's ability to fully discharge its responsibilities is diminished. The Parliamentary Budget Officer has been clear: If the trend continues, eventually, provincial governments will no longer be sustainable. They will likely collapse while the federal government's fiscal room will increase considerably. That is what the Parliamentary Budget Officer has been telling us in his fiscal sustainability report year after year. In other words, unless the trend is reversed, we run the risk of seeing an unprecedented centralization of power in Ottawa, which will take away the Quebec people's ability to control their development according to their needs, strengths, characteristics and wishes. In that regard, at a time when this government is choosing to contribute six times less for health care than Quebec and the provinces are asking for to fix the system, Ottawa has unprecedented fiscal room that is in excess of $80 billion, or three times the amount of the health care requests. Let me explain. Ottawa increasingly budgets money for voted items that it fails to spend year after year. When you add up the items that were voted and the spending that was authorized but not spent last year, $41 bilion was left on the table. Let me repeat that. Some $41 billion was left on the table because it was voted or authorized but not spent. This is in addition to another $40 billion in extra fiscal room, according to the Parliamentary Budget Officer. If the federal government wanted to maintain its debt-to-GDP ratio, it could increase spending or reduce revenues by that amount. When we talk about unprecedented centralization and the fact that the money is here, we are talking about $81 billion in one single year. That is three times the amount the provinces and Quebec were asking for to better fund health care. Ottawa said no and agreed to six times less. That is peanuts. The federal government is gradually stabilizing its share, and the money stays here. That money will be used for new programs that interfere in our jurisdictions. There is no respect for the governments of Quebec and the provinces or for the National Assembly. It was with these important challenges in mind that the Bloc Québécois drew up its expectations for the 2023 federal budget. We presented them to the minister a few weeks ago. Considering the challenges we are facing, now is not the time for shiny new programs, which are often not within the federal government's purview anyway, nor for pre-election pandering. Financially speaking, the way to avoid austerity is to be prudent. Economically speaking, the best way to insulate ourselves from the potential turmoil of an extraordinarily uncertain environment is to tackle the fundamental issues. In this period of uncertainty, we need to get back to the essentials. The strengths of Quebec's economy are precisely what is needed to succeed in a rapidly changing world. Also, the way to meet the current needs of the different sectors of Quebec's economy is to finally step into the 21st century. We have an abundant supply of clean, renewable energy, especially hydroelectricity. In this area, the shift is already under way, and we are ready to move on to the next step, which is a net-zero economy. If our forests are managed sustainably, they are renewable resources that could be one of the keys to replacing hydrocarbons. More research would allow more processing and greater generation of wealth with this resource. Our proximity agriculture has already espoused the model of the future in favour of short circuits and food security. We need to help our farmers face the current international turmoil that is inflating input prices and we need to help them develop more sustainable practices. That is the future. When it comes to critical minerals essential to the redevelopment of supply chains and the electrification of transportation, the only mines in operation in Canada are in our neck of the woods. We need to move from mines to batteries and become an essential link in the chain, especially when it comes to supplying North America. Obviously, all that development needs to respect the highest environmental standards, in partnership with indigenous communities and with the agreement of local communities. It is good for the green economy, it is good for economic resilience, it is good for strategically positioning Quebec in a changing world. Another one of Quebec's strengths is its creativity. A stagnant society struggles to cope with change. The antidote is creativity, and Quebec has that in spades. This is especially true for its arts and culture sector, so we must ensure that it maintains its vitality and influence, and the French language is the most vivid expression of that creativity. That being said, this same is true for all fields. Yesterday's tinkerers are now working in artificial intelligence, creating the next video game, developing the next green finance instruments, working on the aeronautics industry of tomorrow. That is already the case. As Canada's technology hub, Quebec has what it takes to become silicon valley north, as long as we support our cutting-edge sectors. Finally, there is our social model, particularly our tax and family policies. Because of them, wealth is more evenly distributed in Quebec than anywhere else on the continent. The middle class is larger in Quebec than elsewhere in Canada or the United States and, in a world that is under pressure, that guarantees a more peaceful life and social harmony. That is why it is so important to maintain the Quebec government's ability to take action, and that is why we must seriously address the fiscal imbalance that undermines that ability. As with all of the expectations set out in the committee report we are discussing, the Bloc Québécois presented a series of requests covering many aspects of Quebec's economy. We outlined them here. They reflect the requests expressed by various sectors of Quebec society when consultations were held by all members of the Bloc Québécois. They respond to Quebec's real needs. They will help Quebec deal with all the existing crises and will make us more resilient. They will enable Quebec to embrace the future with confidence.

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