44th Parl. 1st Sess.
October 17, 2023 10:00AM
- Oct/17/23 10:56:00 a.m.
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Uqaqtittiji, the infrastructure gap for first nations, Inuit and Métis communities is estimated at over $300 billion. That is almost more than the entirety of the federal government's annual budget. Recently, the Prime Minister announced that he would ask all ministries to make cuts in their budgets, and this is a huge concern for indigenous services being delivered for indigenous peoples.
I wonder if the member agrees that making cuts to Indigenous Services and Northern Affairs Canada, CIRNAC, will have major detrimental impacts on the conditions that first nations, Métis and Inuit already live under.
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- Oct/17/23 12:10:22 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, I think Canadians should be suspicious anytime they see a motion that talks generally about government spending without anyone having done the homework to identify the real waste.
There is sometimes waste in government spending. We have seen our fair share of that with the ArriveCAN app and the tens of billions of dollars that have been shunted out the door to big consulting companies to do the work that properly belongs in the civil service, padding the pockets of KPMG and others.
There is waste in government, but a motion like the one before us should be singling it out. I think also of the massive investments in child care that I ran on in 2015 and that the New Democrats supported for a long time. They are actually helping to make room in Canadians' household budgets. There is more than one way to tackle inflation, and in the NDP we believe the best way is to work collectively to lower the cost of things Canadians cannot do without rather than simply cutting taxes when we know grocery stores and oil companies will gladly raise their prices to eat up the extra disposable income.
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- Oct/17/23 12:37:57 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, I know that before this member, the member for King—Vaughan made the comment that only Conservatives know how to bring in a balanced budget. I am assuming this member thinks the same thing.
An hon. member: That's right.
Mr. Mark Gerretsen: Madam Speaker, she just yelled that I am right.
The unfortunate thing for her is that no Conservative has ever done it, not in Brian Mulroney's time and not in Stephen Harper's time. Let me correct that record. It is true that Stephen Harper had two surpluses in the beginning, but those came off the heels of Paul Martin's budgets. The only prime ministers since 1970 to actually run a surplus, a balance or have no deficit have been Jean Chrétien and Paul Martin. There is absolutely no historical record that would suggest that Conservatives actually have the know-how to do that.
Could the member please inform the House as to exactly how Conservatives would do that, and without the rhetoric of bringing down interest rates to lower inflation?
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- Oct/17/23 12:39:03 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, while the member was asking his question, I was looking for the Liberals' plan to balance the budget or how many times they have done so. I obviously could not find anything, and I will remind the member that it was the Prime Minister who thought budgets would balance themselves.
The Liberals were left with a surplus when they formed government in 2015, and they withered that away. It was the Liberal-NDP government that said it would not run deficits of more than $10 billion. Now we are sitting at half a trillion dollars in deficit, which drove up interest rates, and now we are in this looming crisis.
The government needs to get its deficit under control so that Canadians do not lose their homes.
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- Oct/17/23 4:16:15 p.m.
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Mr. Speaker, sometimes, once in a generation, the Conservatives have an idea that makes a modicum of sense. Unfortunately, they always hide their good ideas behind wacky political stunts.
Last June, the Bloc Québécois supported a similar motion calling for a plan to return to balanced budgets. We believe that this is the reasonable and responsible thing to do for a government. Governments need to have some idea of what is ahead.
The Conservatives are once again trying to force the government to table a road map to balanced budgets. However, they want it in a few days only, by October 25.
If it is so important—and we believe it is— why are the Conservatives once again sticking this inside a political black pill that is impossible to swallow and that they will then use to show that the Liberal government has stumbled and not delivered? The Liberals are perfectly capable of doing that themselves without “gotcha” motions.
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- Oct/17/23 5:28:13 p.m.
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Mr. Speaker, I thank my NDP colleague for his intervention.
I will continue to read from the written motion, which is an official House of Commons document. If my colleague would like to have the full version, he can ask the table clerks, who are very helpful.
. . . inflation driving deficits so that interest rates can be lowered, in order to avoid a mortgage default crisis, as warned by the International Monetary Fund, and to ensure Canadians do not lose their homes, the House call on the government to introduce a fiscal plan that includes a pathway back to balanced budgets, in order to decrease inflation and interest rates, and to introduce this in the House of Commons prior to the Bank of Canada’s next policy interest rate decision on October 25, 2023.
Yes, the timeline is short, but this government has been in power for eight years. I hope the government members see things the way we do. We are back in the House after a week in our ridings. I have to say that everyone I met in Portneuf—Jacques-Cartier told me that they are struggling to balance their budgets, that they do not know how they are going to put food on the table and heat their homes properly. Unfortunately, in Canada, and particularly in Quebec, winter is pretty harsh. We have to heat our homes, we have to eat and, yes, we have to put gas in the car. My riding covers a low-density area, which means that people need a vehicle. There is no public transit. Unfortunately, that is the reality. We cannot bury our heads in the sand. We cannot ignore the facts. That is a reality, and we have to take it into account.
The Prime Minister stated, with a completely straight face, that budgets balance themselves. I am a father, and there are probably many parents here who have responsibilities and have to manage a budget. I have some news for the Prime Minister. I do not know whether budgets balance themselves in his ivory tower, but down here on earth, on the ground, in our homes, we have to balance our budgets. If not, we will be headed for bankruptcy, so we need to be responsible.
What is worse, at a certain point, the Liberals also said that it was time to borrow money because rates were low and they would not go up. We can see that today's reality is drastically different. Yesterday, I met with representatives of the Quebec Professional Association of Real Estate Brokers. They travelled here to Ottawa, and I met with them. I think it is important that members of Parliament meet with people to find out what is happening on the ground. I think that the government members should adopt such a practice. According to what the association representatives told me, we are going to hit a wall. It will not be long until the banks will have to start collecting house keys because people cannot pay their mortgages. That is a reality.
Today I met representatives from Pets Canada, a network of manufacturers, retailers and pet enthusiasts. Many of us have pets like cats and dogs. These pets are part of our families. Customers who buy dog or cat food are worried, because they will have to forgo buying food for their pets so that they themselves can survive. We are in Canada in 2023. I think that is important.
I will read other quotes from the Prime Minister, just for the fun of it.
“You'll forgive me if I don't think about monetary policy.” That was from August 19, 2021.
Here is another one: “We took on debt so Canadians wouldn't have to.”
However, as my colleague mentioned, it is taxpayers' money we are talking about. Governments do not make money, they simply administer the taxes collected from Canadian taxpayers.
Here is another quote from the Prime Minister, this one from 2015: “We're proposing a strong and real plan, one that invests in the middle class, so we can grow the economy, not from the top down...but from the heart outwards. That's what Canada has always done well”.
Now I want to talk about the Prime Minister's broken promises. This Prime Minister said the government would run a small deficit in 2015, tiny, temporary, no more than $10 billion. That was a broken promise. Then he said it would never go over $30 billion. Another broken promise. The Prime Minister said he would return to balanced budgets in 2019 and that this commitment was set in stone. What does he take us for? Once again, another broken promise.
As I mentioned, after eight years, the Prime Minister has added more to the debt than all of our country's prime ministers combined. This is serious. During question period yesterday, the Deputy Prime Minister again stated that Canada has the lowest deficit and the lowest debt-to-GDP ratio. I would like to ask the Deputy Prime Minister to go for a walk in the streets with me to talk to people. What will they tell her? They will tell her they are struggling to get by. There needs to be an action plan, and soon, to get the budget back into balance. It is about being responsible.
Now, on the other side of the House, they do not understand that. It is the job of the official opposition to force them to do their job and do it as quickly as possible, because it has been eight years. I hope they are not just waking up today because of the motion we moved. I hope they woke up several months ago and are working on finding a solution to balance the budget as quickly as possible.
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