SoVote

Ms. Julie Dzerowicz (Davenport, Lib.)

May/1/24 5:06:33 p.m.
Watch

Mr. Speaker, I am going to be sharing my time with the member for Sackville—Preston—Chezzetcook. As always, it is a true honour for me to be speaking in the venerable House on behalf of the residents of my riding of Davenport. Today I am going to be speaking to federal budget 2024. It is a very important budget. It is 416 pages. I will not be able to go through all of it, but I will focus on a few key areas. I will start by talking about what I think is the overall theme of our budget, which is fairness for every generation. We have been talking a lot about some of the pre-announcements that our government made before we introduced federal budget 2024. There is a huge focus, and rightly so, on the gen Zs and millennials, but I just want to reiterate that the theme is fairness for every generation. There is a lot in the budget that will benefit every single generation here in Canada. The other question that we asked ourselves and that is important to note as we are going through a number of measures I will be talking about today is “What kind of Canada do we want to live in?”. The measures in our budget very much answer that question. I also believe that the measures we have comprise a plan that would meet the current moment, including the challenges and opportunities of the current moment. On Friday, as I always do every single year, I hosted a town hall respecting federal budget 2024, with Davenport residents. They had a lot of questions, which took over an hour. I am going to speak to the top three issues that I heard at the town hall. The first thing I want to talk about is housing. That is the top concern for Davenport residents. We receive a lot of letters and a lot of calls, and when I go to events, that is what I hear from millennials, gen Zs and also from parents and grandparents who are are worried about their kids and grandkids being able to live in the city where they have grown up. Indeed, the core focus of federal budget 2024 is getting housing built as quickly as possible, getting as much supply as possible into the marketplace. I do not know whether members noticed, but the week before federal budget 2024, we actually introduced our master housing plan, and there are three parts to it. First is building more single-family homes. Second is how it is that we are going to make it easier for Canadians to own or rent a home. The third part of our housing plan is helping Canadians who cannot afford a home, and that is by building more deeply affordable housing, whether for students, seniors or persons with disabilities. Part of the whole plan is also eliminating chronic homelessness in Canada. There are a number of new measures that we have included in the budget. One that I want to focus on is using under-utilized federal lands for housing in Canada. I am very excited about this because in Davenport, something we have been pushing the federal government to look at is particularly using federal commercial lands in the hands of the government for affordable housing or for the use of local communities. We made a big push for Canada Post lands to be relooked at. Indeed, within federal budget 2024, we have introduced the whole concept of freeing up some of the lands that currently are under-utilized and available, and they would be used for affordable housing spaces. I want to thank Davenport residents very much for pushing this idea, and the ministers and the Prime Minister for ensuring that we take a serious look at the federal lands that are in our hands and making them available right across this country. The second issue that is important for Davenport residents is affordability. We do have an affordability crisis in Canada. I have been very proud of our federal government, which has introduced a number of programs over the last few years that have been extremely beneficial, have strengthened our social welfare system, and have also made life more affordable. The national child care system, our national dental care plan, our Canada worker benefit and our increase in OAS payments by 10% are just a few of those programs. In federal budget 2024, we also introduced the Canada disability benefit and the national school food program. I will speak to both very quickly. On the Canada disability benefit, I am very happy that we have introduced phase one, which would be $6.1 billion over six years, beginning in 2024-25, and would be $1.4 billion ongoing. That would provide a maximum benefit of $2,400 per person for low-income persons with disabilities. To me, this is great news. Every bit of money will help, particularly during times when we have inflation that is higher than normal. This is phase one, and I know many Davenport residents are going to continue the work, including with me, to try to see if, in future years, we can get more money allocated to the Canada disability benefit. However, the dollars we have now are very much appreciated and would go a long way. The second thing I want to mention is our national school food program, which would benefit more than 400,000 kids in Canada. It would save the average family with two children as much as $800 per year in grocery prices. Again, I am very proud of the affordability measures we continue to have in federal budget 2024. I know it would go a long way to help support not only residents of my riding of Davenport, but also Canadians right across this country. This is the last area I want to spend a bit of time on. Looking at all the programs we have introduced to expand our social welfare system and to help Canadians with the affordability and the housing crises we have in Canada today, there are often those who ask me how we are going to pay for it. I am very proud to say that we do have an economic plan that would set up Canada and Canadians for future growth and prosperity. The measures we have introduced in our budget this year would very much build on a number of measures we have introduced over the last few years. I will speak to some of them now. First, we put $2.4 billion toward AI leadership. We would launch a new AI compute access fund and a Canadian AI sovereign compute strategy that would support AI adoption across the entire Canadian economy. It is very important for us to make this investment. It would help Canadian researchers start up and scale up businesses, and access the computational power and the digital tools they need to compete, and it would help catalyze the development of Canadian-owned and Canadian-located AI infrastructure. We also introduced the new investment tax credits to attract companies to invest across the electric vehicle supply chains. These are much-welcomed tax credits by the electric vehicle sector. We, indeed, have made huge investments. This continues to ensure we would have a very robust structure and would become global leaders in this area. I want to note that in our fall economic statement, we introduced the clean technology manufacturing investment tax credits, which are very beneficial for the transition we are trying to make to a low-carbon future and a low-carbon economy. There are two other great things I want to speak to. We have made a $5.9-billion investment in research and scholarships, and also in new strategy research infrastructure. In my community, for many years, I have had a number of university post-docs and doctoral students come up to me and ask for more core research grants and more scholarships and fellowships. Indeed, we have made a historic investment in federal budget 2024. I am very pleased that it is there. It would bode well for a good economic future. The last thing I will say may sound unsexy, but I think it is sexy because it is going to help our Canadian economy. We have introduced a national regulatory alignment. Essentially, we are trying to eliminate interprovincial and interterritorial trade barriers. When we do that, we make it easier for companies, businesses, non-profits, people and goods to move across our country. It is great for our current economy and for our future economy, and it would bode well for our future prosperity. We have set up what I would call a “registry” so that we would have an idea what those barriers are and could start eliminating them systematically. In 416 pages, we have something that would benefit every generation in Canada. I am very proud to stand here on behalf of Davenport residents. I am now ready to answer any questions.

1522 words

Context: House Hansard - 306 - May/1/24

Ms. Julie Dzerowicz

May/1/24 5:17:24 p.m.
Watch

Mr. Speaker, I will say the following: I sit on the finance committee, and it is a privilege to do so. We hear, all the time, from experts across the country about how to resolve the housing crisis. One thing we hear, time and time again, is that it will not be resolved at just the federal level. All three levels of government need to work together to resolve the housing crisis. For about 30 years, all three levels did not invest enough. We now have a lot a money in. We have a lot of input. We have a lot of great programs, and there is an opportunity for every level of government to have input and to do their part to ensure that every Canadian has a safe, accessible, affordable place to live.

135 words

Context: House Hansard - 306 - May/1/24

Ms. Julie Dzerowicz

May/1/24 5:18:54 p.m.
Watch

Mr. Speaker, here is what I would say: I think that sometimes we have to remind ourselves of this, even though we want to forget it. We, not just Canada, but also the world, have come out of a massive pandemic. I think all of our economies have been struggling to recuperate. Very blessedly, here in Canada, we have been very lucky that we have been able to bring back over 100% of all the jobs that had been lost and that we continue to have strong fundamentals in terms of our finances. Our growth, right now, is predicted to be the highest this year and the next, according to the Bank of Canada and the IMF. We continue to have a AAA credit rating. Only 11 countries in the world have that. We have the lowest debt-to-GDP ratio in the G7, and it continues on a downward track. Canada's balance sheet remains the best of the G7's. Therefore, I would say that we have a good track record. We have a good balance sheet, and we have a lot to look forward to, in terms of prosperity, moving forward.

194 words

Context: House Hansard - 306 - May/1/24

Ms. Julie Dzerowicz

May/1/24 5:20:59 p.m.
Watch

Mr. Speaker, if the member is asking whether I would have wanted it to have been fully funded to what the Canadian disability sector had asked for, I would say a resounding yes. However, I was proud that this is one of the largest line items in our entire budget. We have absolutely made this a priority. I will also say that it is not the only thing that will be helpful to Canadians with disabilities. We have automatic tax filings. We have a national dental care plan that will benefit them. We have phase one of a national pharmacare plan that will support them. We have made historic investments in our health care program, both last year and this year. I think all of that, collectively, is going to support not only Canadians with disabilities but also all Canadians moving forward.

142 words