44th Parl. 1st Sess.
December 7, 2023 10:00AM
- Dec/7/23 11:59:51 a.m.
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Madam Speaker, I know my hon. colleague is deeply passionate about this and knowledgeable. She is a mom of young kids. It deeply concerns me the kind of future we are handing over to our children.
I was privileged enough to sit in on a finance committee meeting when we had the Parliamentary Budget Officer with us. He clarified for I think the millionth time in this place that 0.15% of food inflation could be attributed to the carbon tax, whereas 3.5% was attributed to drought, disease and an unpredictable growing season. It really is the climate impacts we need to address in this House. I am glad she highlighted that.
Also, I find the tokenizing happening with respect to indigenous peoples offensive and disturbing. I really want to reiterate that Métis and Inuit people were excluded from this opposition day motion.
I will move quickly to the piece about windfall tax profits. I would like to learn more about this, as I am concerned about it. We cannot trust oil and gas companies to do the right thing. Would it be possible to pass on those taxes to the consumer through increased prices? I am looking for more clarity on that.
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- Dec/7/23 12:35:23 p.m.
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Mr. Speaker, it is an honour to take part in this very important and timely debate. I am very concerned about our country, and I hope all 338 of us take some time to talk to Canadians over Christmas. Let us knock on 100 doors, go and find out, straight from the people we work for, what life has now become after eight long years of Liberal government, the policies it has enacted and the living hell that Canadians are living through because of the Liberal policies.
Today, we are going to talk about the carbon tax. There are many terrible policies the Liberals have put forward, but this is just about the carbon tax and what it has done to Canada. It is with a heavy heart that I am reading the statistics of what Canadians are facing: 30-year high inflation challenges just to live. What does that mean? It means that Canadians are not keeping up with inflation. At the end of the month, there are more days left than there is money in the bank account. That means Canadians are skipping meals.
We are the breadbasket of the world. I come from a province that grows things that we sell to and that feed the world. We are put into this task by God; we are given this land by God, to feed the world and to feed Canadians. We grow so much that, as Canadians, we cannot eat all that we grow, so we trade. We are a trading nation, and that is a good thing. It is what actually sustains families on the other side of the world. The policies of the current government mean that there are families starving, not just in far-flung places around the world but also right here in Canada. Eleven million Canadians needed food stamps or their equivalent from the government last year. They could not provide enough for their family to eat. The government had to help one in four Canadians. This is not right.
These are very, very tough times for Canadians, and things are going to get tougher. That has more to do with the interest rate hikes and what they are going to cause with respect to mortgage renewals. They are going to skyrocket. Right now, families are holding on by their fingertips. The tipping point is going to come in a number of months and years as mortgages are renewed. The problem also occurs on rental properties, so we know that rents are going to go up. We know that the price of rent in Canada has doubled already. What happens when the owners of rental buildings have to renew their mortgages? Rents are going to continue to go up.
What we are debating today is a terrible tax. It is a tax on movement. It is a tax on things we used to do very well in this country. We do things. We are known as a country that grows more canola and more wheat than anywhere else in the world. We build things. We rip it out of the ground. We refine. We value-add different God-given gifts to our country, and we sell because we cannot utilize as much as we can produce in this country. That is a good thing. That is how, for over 150 years, we have been so prosperous as a nation. What we have, from eight long years of the current Liberal government, is an attack on that, with the carbon tax on anything that moves. If it continues to move, the government taxes it harder.
We know that the Liberals are going to quadruple the tax. What is that going to mean? Academia's theory of the carbon tax is that if the Liberals keep increasing the price, people will stop using that item. The theory is faulty. All we have to do is look at the price per litre of gasoline in other parts of the world that are not as gifted with natural resources as we are. In Europe, it is roughly equivalent to around $5 to $6 Canadian per litre. Europeans are still driving; they have to drive. In Canada, we have to drive in order to get to work to provide for our family. We need to utilize oil and gas to produce the crops that feed the world.
The one disincentive that the government has decided on is to attack anything that moves. That is what the carbon tax does. It is a tax on being productive. Just look at what it has done in Atlantic Canada, where the government has carved out a special deal that exempts the region from tax on home heating oil. It has destroyed the argument of why we need the carbon tax. The government, supported by the NDP, has proposed that if home heating oil is to be exempt in Atlantic Canada, it is due to the cost of living. Wait a minute. Did it not just say that Canadians receive more money back than they pay? The rationale for Atlantic Canada is that people there are in a cost of living crisis, which they are. To make things better just in that region of the country, not all over Canada, the government removed the tax. The government's argument that people receive more back has just been blown to pieces, because if that were true, then the government has actually made the cost of living crisis worse in Atlantic Canada. Therefore, it is not believed to be true.
The government has also argued in favour of making more expensive the dirtiest forms of energy with respect to emissions. The worst for emissions is home heating oil. It actually made that cheaper, the one source of energy that, if the government believed in its logic, should have been costing more. The government's arguments are blown out of the water.
I will get back to my conclusion of why this all wraps up into the motion. If we look at the troubles we are facing in Canada, we know that it is tough out there. Anything the Canadian government can do to make life more affordable is something we should act on today. We have a long list of things the government should have been doing for the last eight years, but it has decided to ignore those suggestions. Just with this motion today, we could remove the carbon tax on home heating for farmers, first nations and families, three groups that are hurting and that we could affect today.
Take off the tax, and, instantaneously, food prices would drop, because the tax is baked into all of the actions of a farmer. If we remove the tax, instantaneously, food would become cheaper for first nations. There is a lot of neglect from the government on reserves, but I cannot think of a worse example than this: A lot of first nations and reserves use electricity to heat their homes. Right now, the government is jacking up the rate of carbon tax on those homes, homes of individuals who are barely holding on with the cost of living crisis that is taking place, and now, it is going to quadruple the carbon tax. The third group is families. We know that they are going to have to pay $700 more next year alone just on groceries because of the carbon tax. That is $700 in sports fees they will not have. Layered on top of the troubles with interest rates increasing, we know this is a recipe for disaster. There are Canadian families that are just struggling now but will be starving.
I am not putting blame on anyone, but this is a Liberal policy. It is not the families of the Liberal members of Parliament that are going to be suffering. It is going to be the other families throughout Canada that have a severe challenge with the cost of living. We can make that all better today. Increasing costs are not all going to be reduced because of the policies of the government, but this is one area in which, if we act as Parliament, we could act before Christmas to make food cheaper, to make life more affordable and to make Canada that much better. If I am true to the people I represent and the stories I hear, I cannot think of another group that has been so challenged under the Liberal policies and that we need to provide relief for. That is what the motion would do.
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- Dec/7/23 1:18:28 p.m.
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Mr. Speaker, the Governor of the Bank of Canada cited that the carbon tax is causing about a 0.15% impact on inflation. This was confirmed by the PBO. That is 15¢ on a bag of groceries that is $100.
The Conservatives are getting away with this runaway train of a disinformation campaign that the carbon tax is the major factor when it comes to grocery store prices. We know it is corporate greed, because the big grocery stores are recording record profits. The reason the Conservatives are able to get away with convincing Canadians to buy into this campaign is that the government has failed to go after the CEOs of the big grocery stores. There is no difference, really, when it comes to Liberals and Conservatives being gatekeepers for the rich and well connected.
Will the Liberals finally go after the big grocery store chains and take real, meaningful action so that it shows up at the till when people are trying to buy their groceries?
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- Dec/7/23 3:45:04 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, as global market forces and inflation continue to hit Canadians, too many families are feeling the pressure of their monthly bills. Already, the Government of Canada has taken action on affordable child care, home retrofits, grocery prices and more. Now, we are taking an ambitious next step with a new energy affordability package. Can the member speak about energy affordability measures and what they include as we move forward with the package?
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- Dec/7/23 4:35:48 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, it is an honour again to join the debate in the House on the price on pollution.
By my count, this is the 13th time Conservatives have brought forward some sort of motion on eliminating carbon pricing since the MP for Carleton became their leader, but it could very well be more than that. I have heard today that it is the 19th time some permutation of this motion has been brought forward. It is ironic, because Conservatives ran in the last election on bringing in carbon pricing. It did not make a lot of sense, but at least it was something. In fact, it was not the only time they ran on bringing in a carbon price. Under Stephen Harper in 2008, they ran on, get this, the green plan, but then, just like now, they flip-flopped. Now they say they want to cut it, and they are masquerading the motion as some measure in support of affordability in Canada, as if carbon pricing were the reason the cost of living challenges in Canada right now are significant.
However, the Bank of Canada has recently confirmed that the price on pollution is responsible for only one-sixth of 1% of the inflation we are seeing. Contrary to the rhetoric we hear from Conservatives, when we look at the facts, economist have shown that the price on pollution is responsible for less than 1% of the increase we are seeing in food prices. Not only that, when Conservatives talk about the carbon price, they refuse to mention the rebates that are returned to individuals through the—
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