44th Parl. 1st Sess.
February 6, 2024 10:00AM
- Feb/6/24 1:34:49 p.m.
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Mr. Speaker, looking at the statistics, there are increases or decreases in different jurisdictions. One can cherry-pick certain jurisdictions and say, “This jurisdiction is seeing a lower rate; therefore our government's policies must be successful.”
However, when we look at the aggregate across the country, there has been a 34% increase. This increase has been most stark in provinces like Ontario and Quebec. Why is that? It is because the port of Montreal has become such a conduit for getting stolen vehicles abroad. It is because of the current government, which has a responsibility for the ports and a responsibility to protect our borders, that we have seen the port of Montreal become such a conduit for stolen vehicles. That is why we are seeing a commensurate increase in Ontario and Quebec.
However, it is not just an Ontario and Quebec issue. In Alberta, vehicles have been stolen for many years. F-350s are being re-vinned and sent down to the United States. They are being sent to chop shops. This is a cross-Canada issue, and we cannot neglect any part of the country with our response.
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- Feb/6/24 1:38:29 p.m.
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Mr. Speaker, I would ask specifically whether the hon. member could comment on what seems to be the rapid increase in not being able to effectively catch vehicles in the process of being stolen. I know there have been high-profile cases. I have heard that it has been the case in Alberta as well that somebody will put an air tag in the vehicle and be able to follow it, yet law enforcement does not seem to either have the resources or be able to get the vehicle before it is shipped overseas.
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- Feb/6/24 3:01:38 p.m.
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Unfortunately, Mr. Speaker, what the member is saying is simply not true. Just before Christmas, we put out a study by Environment and Climate Change Canada that shows that carbon pricing will be responsible for between 20% and 30% of our greenhouse gas emissions between 2019 and 2030.
On the issue of carbon pricing and climate change, we have no lessons to take from the Conservative Party, whose official position today, as Alberta is suffering from droughts, as there are unforeseen storms in eastern Canada and atmospheric rivers in B.C., is still that climate change simply does not exist.
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Madam Speaker, I am thankful for the opportunity to stand in this place and to address a very important issue. That issue comes down to affordability. It comes down to the well-being of Canadians from coast to coast, to those who live in rural areas, in urban areas, in my province of Alberta and in Atlantic Canada.
The debate tonight has to do with being able to buy the very basics of life, including fuel for a person's vehicle so that they can drive to work or take their kids to sport practice. It is a conversation about being able to put food on the table, whether that is fruits, vegetables, grain or dairy. Whatever a family chooses to consume, they should be able to afford those choices.
Furthermore, Bill C-234 is about being able to heat one's home. I do not know about others, but where I live in Alberta, we can get temperatures down to -53°C with the wind chill. I cannot imagine trying to heat my home with a heat pump, as the Liberals would like to suggest is possible, nor can I imagine relying on wind or solar as my sole source of electricity, because we had a proof point, just a few weeks ago, that it just does not work.
Instead, what people rely on to heat their homes in my part of the country is largely natural gas. The Liberal government has attached something called a carbon tax to those very necessities of life, whether it is the food we eat, the fuel that we put in our vehicles or the energy that heats our homes. The carbon tax is punitive in nature, and it is driving up the cost that Canadians have to pay just to survive.
Bill C-234, which we are discussing here today, has to do with taking the carbon tax off the fuel that farmers use for the very necessities of the jobs they do. Imagine putting all of one's time and energy and all of one's labour into producing food for the nation of Canada and for the entire world. Imagine doing that, and then imagine having a government in power that, rather than expressing gratitude toward them, actually punishes them. That is exactly what the Liberals have done for the last eight years.
The carbon tax is extremely punitive in nature. It goes after those individuals working hard to produce food. It does that by applying this tax to the very necessities of production. Whether it is using natural gas to heat a barn in order to keep chickens alive or dairy cattle alive, or whether it is using propane to be able to dry grain, let us say, those are things farmers do on a day to day basis. Those things are necessary to produce food for Canadians and for the world. Those things are required to keep us, as humanity, alive and to drive our economy forward. Rather than celebrating the incredible contribution that farmers are making, the Liberal government has chosen to go after them and to be extremely punitive.
On this side of the House, members got together and came up with an idea. That idea is brilliant. It is supported by producers all across the country. That idea is to remove the carbon tax from fuel, from natural gas and from propane so that farmers can produce food at less expense.
Here is what happens when farmers are empowered to produce food with little expense attached to it. Those savings get passed on to Canadians. Then, when Canadians go to grocery stores and buy food for their families, they are able to pay a little less. However, when the government attaches that tax, it actually drives up the cost of food, so Canadians then have to spend more.
What will happen when Canadians have to spend more? Headlines across this country will show us exactly what will happen. Families are struggling. Millions are lining up at food banks every single month across this country. In my riding, in Lethbridge, Alberta, the food bank use has doubled under the Liberal government. It has doubled.
It is not just folks who maybe do not have homes or who live in low-income housing. It is folks who have full-time jobs and live in middle-class neighbourhoods. It is seniors who rely on fixed incomes, who have worked incredibly hard for 65, 75, maybe 80 years of their lives. It is the students studying at Lethbridge College or the University of Lethbridge who are investing in their education and, because of the government, cannot afford to make ends meet, so they have to go to the food bank. It is the veterans who fought for this country, the country that we love. It is the men and women who sacrificed a great deal, and are now not supported by the government, who are lining up at the food bank.
That is a problem that was created under the watch of the Liberal government, but it did not have to be that way. The government has created policy after policy that has punished Canadians and held them back from achieving greatness, from being able to bring in income and stretch it to cover their costs of life. It is the government that has prevented people from being able to do that.
On this side of the House, there is a concerted effort to give Canadians control of their lives back. There is a concerted effort to make sure they can afford the very necessities they require. Of course, top of mind is to axe the tax, and that is exactly what Bill C-234 would do. Bill C-234 is all about getting rid of this punitive tax, taking it off of farmers and allowing all Canadians to benefit because, when farmers benefit, so do the people who go to the grocery store to buy food. That is what this bill is about.
Here is what the government did. This bill was discussed in this place and then went to the Senate, which started out with some good common-sense thinking. At first, it seemed that the majority in the Senate was going to support this bill because it just makes sense, but then the Liberal government, in particular, the Prime Minister and the Minister of Environment, caught wind of this. What did they do? They got on the phone, asked for meetings and applied pressure. They applied pressure to the senators, who are supposedly independent, and eventually those senators caved. The bill ended up being gutted to the point of being meaningless, and that is what we are now debating in this place.
Canadians deserve better. For starters, they deserve better behaviour from the government, and second, they deserve better policy. They deserve policy that would allow them to work hard for a paycheque, bring that money home and be able to cover the cost of things they need to purchase, whether it is groceries, fuel for their vehicles or their heating bills. Canadians need to be empowered to cover those expenses, and a big part of that is axing the tax.
In my riding, a producer was willing to share his natural gas bill with me. He has a few different parts to his farming operation, but just for one of them, the beef operation, he spends $62,000 a year on the carbon tax. He was willing to share some his bills with me, which I reviewed, and month after month the carbon tax is more than the amount he spent on the actual natural gas used. That is crazy. It is ludicrous that a farmer would have to spend more on the tax than the product itself.
What also needs to be driven home is that we have to remember that all Canadians, including farmers, are not just paying the carbon tax, but the tax on top of it. They are paying a government tax and a provincial tax on top of the carbon tax. It is the greatest scheme for the government to make money, but it is on the backs of Canadians, and the government should be ashamed of itself.
Conservatives are going to work hard. We are going to fight for Canadians. We are going to make sure their paycheques stay powerful. We are going to axe the tax.
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- Feb/6/24 7:38:51 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, it is an honour to enter into debate on such an important subject: food security and the price Canadians pay for food.
I appreciated the amendment that my friend from Regina moved, which I had the opportunity to second. It gives very clear instructions to ensure that this concurrence motion not be concurred in and that it be sent back to committee so we can really get to the root cause of what is forcing Canadians to pay more.
I asked a question earlier about the entire food supply chain, because a lot of people in our country, I think, take for granted the fact that we do have a secure food supply chain. We go to the grocery store, and there is food on the shelves. We have rules and regulations in place that ensure Canadians can trust the food they buy. There is an ingredient list on there that they can count on to ensure there is trust in the process. When meat is brought through the supply chain, it is safe, and we do not have to worry about diseases and things that, throughout human history, have been detrimental to the longevity of people.
I am proud to be the fifth generation to farm in Alberta's special areas and for five generations, I have been proud to help steward that land. I will get to that discussion in a moment. When it comes to where food starts, it starts with the farmers and the ranchers, those who grow and raise the food we eat.
Then, there is the food supply chain, from the farmers and ranchers who start the process, whether it is a grain operation, like my family is proud to be a part of, whether it is a rancher, and I am proud to represent so many of them, or whether it is more modern techniques like greenhouses.
Then there is a stage that one would call the entire food supply chain. I will get to the specific relevance of the carbon tax in just a moment, but when the carbon tax is applied at the first stage of the process, and when the Liberals increase the carbon tax to the degree they are planning to, it will cost an average farmer $150,000 a year, and those costs have to go somewhere.
However, in every step of the food supply chain, there are increased costs. From the farmer to the trucker who moves it from the farm to a storage facility, there are increased costs.
I will use the example of a loaf a bread. The carbon tax is on every step of the process, from the transportation of the raw commodities to be ground into flour, to the flour going to the baker and then into the ovens. It sounds like the Liberals now want to have a special tax for wood-burning stoves, which is quite something. Let us talk about ludicrous and ridiculous.
Then, there is the cost of packaging that food for the supply chain and the cost of its transportation to the grocery store. There is a carbon tax on the cost of heating that grocery store. There is a carbon tax on the cost associated with somebody driving to the grocery store to get their groceries. There are costs at every step of the process. That is the consequence of the carbon tax. Rising costs are a feature, not a flaw, of the Liberal carbon plan.
As I wrap up my discussion, I would say it is time to stop punishing those who are best equipped to lower food prices. It is time to start celebrating and rewarding them and to make sure they are well-equipped to be the champions of the environment and of lower prices. That means axing the tax so that Canadian farmers and the entire Canadian food supply chain can bring down the price of food so that Canadians can afford to eat.
Let us bring it home for Canadians in a way that ensures we do not send Canadians to food banks for the bare necessities. Let us bring prosperity back to this country and lower prices. That is what the Conservative plan will do when we axe the tax and bring home lower prices for everybody.
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- Feb/6/24 7:48:21 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, I hear from the opposite side that they are always talking about the carbon pricing system, half of it, but I do not hear them ever talking about the rebate that people in their communities are receiving.
The average family of four in Alberta would be receiving $386 four times a year, plus, if they are in a rural area, they actually get a rural top-up.
When they are talking with constituents about carbon pricing, are they also asking constituents how they feel about the fact that they are not going to be getting that rebate cheque? That is money right into their accounts, $386, four times a year, plus the rural top-up.
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- Feb/6/24 7:49:09 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, sometimes they just make it way too easy. We have a Liberal member bragging about giving Canadians back the money that they took from them. Forgive me if I disagree with Liberal logic on this.
When Conservatives say we want to axe the tax, we simply want to empower Canadians, who are in the best position to make choices when it comes to the food they eat and the vehicles they drive, and not raise costs only to then send it back to a few people based on a formula, which they certainly did not consult with the people of Alberta on.
In fact, the majority of provinces in this country have actually elected governments that do not support the carbon tax. That is something the member should not forget when trying to impose that left-leaning ideology that has been so destructive on the people of my province, as an example.
It is time to bring some common sense back to the conversation. The member talks about the so-called rural top-up. It is 10% more, yet there are devastating impacts. The Parliamentary Budget Officer himself made it very clear that 60% of Canadians end up paying more in direct and indirect costs, because every stage of the food supply chain, the transportation sector, etc. ends up paying the carbon tax.
It was dishonest of the Liberals to claim it was a revenue-neutral tax, because it is not; it costs hundreds of millions of dollars a year to administer. Then they say that Canadians get more back than they pay into it. That was dishonest as well. At every step of the process, it is time to axe the tax, so that we can empower Canadians to make the decisions that are best for them.
In this case, they so flippantly suggest that they are somehow solving the problem by intentionally raising prices. No. Let us lower the price of food for Canadians, so that Canadians can afford to eat, heat their homes and live the Canadian dream that the Prime Minister and the Liberals have taken away from them.
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- Feb/6/24 7:52:33 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, I appreciate that, because my colleague from Regina—Lewvan is absolutely right. He mentioned the socialist extremes that Saskatchewan faced throughout some of its history and how that ideology held that province back.
I know that for the four years during which the accidental NDP ruled over Alberta, there was pain and suffering. Hundreds of thousands of jobs were lost, and taxes were imposed that certainly the people of Alberta did not vote for. I know now, across this country, we are seeing the devastating consequences of a government that thinks it is, and this comes back to the comments I made before, the master and the king, that it has the right to impose upon the people.
It is time to reorient the priorities of government. It is time for a Conservative government, which will make sure its people are the masters, not the government, and respect Canadians' decisions and their hard-earned dollars. We will axe the tax and bring home lower prices for everybody.
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- Feb/6/24 8:01:46 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, in October of this past year, I asked the government about its selective reversal of the carbon tax for Atlantic Canadians who heat their homes with fuel oil. Incidentally, about 25% of Atlantic Canadians heat their homes with fuel oil, as opposed to 6% in the rest of the country and about 0% in my province of Alberta. However, there is no reduction offered elsewhere in Canada, just in Atlantic Canada. The rationale was explained by the government's Newfoundland regional minister, who said that perhaps people need to elect more Liberals in the Prairies. It is a rare moment of frank honesty from a Liberal minister on how to get financial advantage in Canada. It is easy. Just get on the Liberal gravy train.
However, I am sure it gutted the two Liberal members from Alberta. Respectfully, both of these members have proven good at one thing in particular in Parliament, which is mindlessly reading out clearly ridiculous Liberal talking points on a number of issues. The member for Edmonton Centre, the one who responded to my question, is a minister. He just obfuscated in response to my question. I do not blame him. His colleague the minister from Newfoundland's public assessment about his lack of engagement on this file for his constituents must have stung for quite a while.
Let us get some real perspective on this. The carbon tax on clean-burning natural gas rose this past April by about 27%, to $3.33 per gigajoule. It is going up again this April Fool's Day to $4.21 per gigajoule. It is interesting that this tax on clean-burning natural gas is more than the cost basis of the commodity itself. The average in 2023 was only $2.50. Incidentally, people pay GST on top of the carbon tax, a tax on a tax that is also increasing.
On January 13 this year, residents in the riding of Edmonton Centre felt temperatures drop to -45°C. The average home was using about twice as much natural gas as usual to keep residents safe and warm. Here is the outcome. It gets cold in the Prairies every winter, and the government benefits by collecting more taxes. Cold weather in the Prairies is a gift that keeps on giving to the government, but it is not free. It is an increasing transfer from the pockets of constituents of Edmonton Centre and other Canadians on the Prairies to the Liberal government. Therefore, the member for Edmonton Centre should feel the sting when his colleague announced his ineffectiveness in representing his constituents to all Canadians.
I know the response to my question is going to include one or a few Liberal bromides, such as we should not worry and the government is spending this money to make all things better, neither of which have proven effective. I am going to hear about the virtues of heat pumps and that oil heat in Atlantic Canada costs more than natural gas, so it is only fair, but whatever is said, it will not excuse the Alberta Liberal members of the House for failing to speak for their constituents and the regionally disproportionate share of the carbon tax the government collects from Canadians who live on the Prairies.
I am asking again if the government's exemption from carbon taxes by region, for political purposes, should properly be reduced for all Canadians, regardless of how they stay safe and warm in the winter.
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- Feb/6/24 8:14:07 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, I am going to focus on the part the member opposite raised that concerns carbon pricing because that was the subject of this Adjournment Proceedings question. Therefore, while I have a lot of respect for the member opposite, I will ask him to seek his answers about the Indigenous Services Canada issues he is raising at another time.
When we are talking about carbon pricing, I appreciate the question he has raised. I just want to talk a bit about the way the carbon pricing system works, where there is a federal backstop such as in Ontario. The federal carbon price is revenue-neutral, with proceeds from the federal carbon pricing system being returned to the jurisdiction where they are collected. Provinces and territories that requested the federal system receive these proceeds directly; they can use it as they see fit. However, in other jurisdictions, which would be like those in Ontario, the federal government is returning proceeds to individuals, families, business owners, farmers and indigenous governments through direct payments and targeted programs. This helps make the carbon pricing more affordable and enables households to make investments to increase energy efficiency to further reduce emissions.
The question that the member had raised was specifically regarding indigenous communities, so I do want to address that piece. The Government of Canada recognizes the unique circumstances of first nations, Inuit and Métis people and is returning 1% of the fuel-charge proceeds to indigenous governments in jurisdictions where the federal fuel charge programming is in effect. A total amount of $282 million, representing 1% of the proceeds collected from 2020-21 to 2023-24, is being returned to indigenous governments in eight provinces: Alberta, Saskatchewan, Manitoba, Ontario, New Brunswick, Nova Scotia, Prince Edward Island, and Newfoundland and Labrador.
Environment and Climate Change Canada is working collaboratively with first nations in Ontario, including the Chiefs of Ontario, on the process to transfer $160.6 million in fuel charge proceeds to indigenous governments in Ontario specifically.
The Government of Canada's objective is to return these proceeds in a way that supports economic reconciliation and that helps to strengthen indigenous-Crown partnerships on climate action. The Government of Canada acknowledges the concerns that the Chiefs of Ontario and other indigenous partners have raised and continues to explore potential solutions to address the impacts of carbon pricing on first nations, Inuit and Métis people.
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