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Decentralized Democracy

House Hansard - 271

44th Parl. 1st Sess.
January 30, 2024 10:00AM
Context: House Hansard - 271 - Jan/30/24
Ms. Melissa Lantsman (Thornhill, CPC)
  • Jan/30/24 5:44:26 p.m.
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  • Re: Bill C-59 
Mr. Speaker, I am going to take a moment off the top to ensure the memory of my father is forever etched into the record of this place. Over the holidays, my brother and I, and our families, suddenly lost our father, Michael Lantsman, whose sacrifices were the sacrifices of heroes. We know that he could not wait to see the love of his life and the centre of our universe, whom we lost three years ago, my mother, Ora Lantsman, in the next world. Together, I think they are reunited knowing that they built a life for us, which has given me the opportunity to ensure that Canadians will know their selflessness, their sacrifices and their hardship as I will continue to be guided by the values they imparted and to tell their story, as I have in the House. Their story is the story of so many Canadians who chose this country, made it their home and built a better life than the one they left behind. His memory will be a blessing, and I certainly will make sure of that. I will go back to the regularly scheduled programming. For some, the holiday break was a chance to rest, to see family and to do important work in the community. However, for the Prime Minister, it was a chance, again, to flaunt the rules and to demonstrate just how out of touch he is. Let me start by saying that the Prime Minister has bad judgment. We have seen it. This is a guy who thought it would be a good idea to dress in blackface, to dress up in costumes on a business trip, to flagrantly and blatantly break ethics laws multiple times and to confide trust in ministers who do exactly the same things. We were still shocked to see him accept a free luxury stay last month valued at over $84,000. Mr. Speaker, $84,000 is more than the average family makes in a year. It is a sum that could buy 20,000 meals for a homeless shelter. It is a sum that translates to over $9,000 a night. I would be very interested to learn from the Prime Minister at a future question period what $9,000 a night might buy. I would be even more interested to learn why he did not have the common sense to refuse that free stay, knowing just how ethically dubious and out of touch it was. It is evidenced, of course, by the PMO changing its story three times on who paid for the luxury vacation and when. Let me say, and I think Canadians would agree, that the Prime Minister has every right to take some time off, as do all Canadians. However, that luxury vacation, its cost, its size and its magnitude, is just another example of conveniently deciding to set aside any personal or professional principles to profit from his status in office. It further proves that he is simply out of touch, and it underlines that he understands nothing about the Canadian middle class. The fundamental truth is that the Prime Minister, who is so comfortable in the lap of luxury, cannot pretend to understand Canadians who are struggling. It is evidenced by this bill we have seen in the House that fails to meet the needs of the middle class, to meet the needs of struggling Canadians from coast to coast to coast who tell their MPs, and I am sure they hear it on the other side, of their struggles. We now have rent prices that have doubled. We have seen the reports throughout Christmas. Housing prices have doubled under the government. The cost of home heating has doubled. The price of groceries has increased by 25% this year, all after eight years of a Liberal government led by the Prime Minister. The Prime Minister says that Canadians from all walks of life who are struggling, because of statistics like this, are just “grumpy”. That is what he said in a year-end interview. I have to say to the Prime Minister that “grumpy” is something that happens when, perhaps, one's private jet breaks down, or when the custom sock store runs out of one's favourite pair. What is happening right now is not people being “grumpy”. These are people who are faced with the fear and the anxiety that come with thinking about the survival of their families. These are people confronting the reality that their generation, or their kids, might not be better off than they were. That is real fear and anxiety in the Canadian public right now. People fear for their lives in the face of violent crime, which is up 39% since 2015, and gang-related crime, which has doubled. People are scared when they are faced with the highest murder rate in 30 years. People in the GTA cannot even park their car in the laneway because auto theft is up 50% in just two years; it is up 217% since the Prime Minister has come to office. That is if they are lucky enough to even have a laneway at all, because to buy a home in Toronto, one needs to commit nearly 85% of one's income just for housing costs. Under the Prime Minister, Canada is still on track to have the worst economic growth out of 40 OECD countries, while inflation and high interest rates take more money out of Canadians’ pockets and off their paycheques. Housing remains unaffordable thanks to the refusal to force gatekeepers to get out of the way and actually build homes. On top of this, it is the former immigration minister who broke our immigration system and overwhelmed our housing market with policies that, according to his own cabinet colleague, the current immigration minister, caused the system to get “out of control”. Despite this, and, as usual, people fail upwards in the current government, the minister’s failure was recognized when he became the new housing minister. He is expected to fix the problem that they in fact created over the last eight years. As well, two million people a month visit food banks just to put a decent meal on the table, or worse, they go without. The response to all of this is the fall economic statement. It is an anemic response to a country that so many beyond these walls do not recognize anymore. We know the source of the misery, and we all want it to be over. It is out-of-control government spending that drives up the cost of the goods we buy and the interest we pay. It is the out-of-control taxes that make it more unaffordable to buy a home, to put gas in the car or to buy groceries. It is the out-of-control bureaucracy that makes it harder to build things and to create good-paying jobs. The solution, of course, is to cut spending, cut taxes and cut the bureaucracy, but instead, the bill would continue the deficit spending that is putting us way beyond our means. Now Canadians are realizing that the Prime Minister is just not worth the cost. However, this is what we expect and this is what we get after eight years of the Liberal government. We should now expect that the government will do the opposite of the rational thing. We should expect that the Prime Minister is going to remain detached from the everyday realities and ignore every single point of view that differs from his own. The country needs a lot of change after eight years. We cannot trust the people who have gotten us into this mess to get us out of it. After a cabinet retreat in a downtown luxury hotel about the middle class, of course, far away from anyone in the middle class, and after a Christmas when Canadians actually cut back without anyone over there taking notice, my Conservative colleagues and I are looking forward to a day when we can see a fall economic statement that actually addresses the misery that Canadians have been telling us about every single time we are at home in our communities. There is going to be a clear choice. People can have the Liberals, who will raise taxes and inflate regulation and red tape, pump up inflation and interest rates and let crime, chaos, drugs and disorder run rampant, or they can have Conservatives, with a simple plan of axing the tax. We are going to build homes, fix the budget and stop crime. That will be the future choice for Canadians. It is a future where housing is affordable and food is affordable, where communities are safe, and where our nation is strong at home and back to being respected abroad. We know that future is possible, because we knew it before. Life was not like this before the current government, and life will not be like this when it is gone.
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