44th Parl. 1st Sess.
May 21, 2024 10:00AM
- May/21/24 11:29:49 a.m.
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Madam Speaker, according to the Governor of the Bank of Canada, the carbon tax is responsible for 0.8% of inflation, or about one-third of inflation. We could dramatically reduce the cost of food today for children, for seniors and for everyone who is going hungry. Food banks have never been so busy; they have never had such a stretched demand. Why do we not cut the carbon tax today and let people eat?
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- May/21/24 11:31:09 a.m.
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Madam Speaker, unfortunately, the answer to that is no.
Often when I am talking to constituents, they will tell me they cannot believe how much one bag of groceries costs. They will go to grab a couple things for dinner or grab a couple things for the weekend, and have one bag. That one bag used to be $20. Now it is $50, $75 or even $100 just to fill one bag of groceries. It is incredible and there is a way to fix it right away. We can eliminate a third of inflation today by getting rid of the carbon tax.
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- May/21/24 2:27:16 p.m.
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Mr. Speaker, I am so pleased that the Conservative leader brought up inflation, because it gives me the opportunity to give Canadians some great news. In April, the inflation rate went down to 2.7%. That is the lowest it has been in three years. It is all thanks to our fiscally responsible plan.
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- May/21/24 2:27:56 p.m.
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Mr. Speaker, today we learned the terrible news that inflation is 35% above target. Again, after eight years, the Prime Minister is not worth the cost of debt interest.
They cannot do basic math over there. That 0.7% is actually a third higher than the 2% target. They are patting themselves on the back when they realize that Canadians cannot afford to eat, heat and house themselves.
Why do they not, instead of quadrupling the carbon tax on the backs of Canadians, follow our common-sense plan to suspend all gas and diesel tax until Labour Day?
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- May/21/24 2:28:38 p.m.
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Mr. Speaker, the Conservative leader has quite proudly and publicly called for the Governor of the Bank of Canada to be fired. Maybe it is the Conservative leader who should lose his job because he just revealed his astonishing ignorance of the Bank of Canada's inflation target.
The Bank of Canada has a target of between 1% and 3%. For four months in a row, inflation in Canada has been within that target. That is good news for Canadians.
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- May/21/24 2:30:00 p.m.
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Mr. Speaker, the reality is that the Conservative leader is the one who is totally incompetent.
The only thing he knows how to do is to criticize Canada, criticize Canadians and criticize our wonderful country.
The fact is that the inflation rate has come down to 2.7%. That is a huge success for our country. Every member should be pleased.
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- May/21/24 2:30:40 p.m.
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Mr. Speaker, not only does the incompetent finance minister not know the inflation target, she does not know that one locks in low rates when one has the chance.
Do members remember when the Prime Minister was saying to not worry, that we can double the national debt because, as he said, “Interest rates are at historic lows, Glen”?
The problem is that I told him at the time that they should lock in those rates for 10 years, or 30 years, with long-term bonds. It turns out that they did not do that, and now $400 billion of that debt will roll over into these higher rates, forcing Canadians to spend more on interest than on health care.
Why did he hire the worst mortgage broker in the world to be our finance minister?
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- May/21/24 2:31:26 p.m.
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Mr. Speaker, it is clear that the Conservative leader is in a grouchy mood today. I think we all know why. The only thing he knows how to do is talk down Canada. What he just cannot bear is the reality that, thanks to our fiscally responsible economic plan, inflation is at a three-year low.
Inflation has been within the Bank of Canada's target rate for four months in a row. That is good news for Canada and Canadians.
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- May/21/24 2:40:04 p.m.
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Mr. Speaker, I am so glad that the Conservatives are raising questions about the cost of living and the lives of Canadians, because it gives me an opportunity to point out that inflation was 2.7% in April. That is the fourth month in a row that inflation has been within the Bank of Canada's target range. For 15 months now, wage increases have been outpacing inflation. That helps Canadians.
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- May/21/24 2:57:59 p.m.
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Mr. Speaker, our government has put forward a plan for fairness for every generation, a plan to invest in housing, in affordability and in economic growth. We have done it in a fiscally responsible way because we know inflation has to come down, so that interest rates can come down. To do that, we are asking those who are the most successful in our amazing country to contribute a little bit more.
That is tax fairness. We support it. The party that opposes it is the Conservatives.
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- May/21/24 3:00:55 p.m.
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Mr. Speaker, what the minister should remember is that over the last nine years, this government, with help from their Bloc Québécois friends, has created the conditions that have made today's cost of living unaffordable, raised interest rates and increased inflation.
This government, aided by the Bloc Québécois, voted in $500 billion in inflationary spending. As a result, Canadians and Quebeckers are now faced with a housing shortage or unaffordable options.
Can the minister answer my question more thoughtfully?
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- May/21/24 5:10:17 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, I would like to acknowledge that my colleague used the World Economic Forum in his speech to keep the Conservative base happy. I sometimes think that the current leader of the Conservative Party is really unhappy with the WEF because former prime minister Stephen Harper never let him go when he was a cabinet minister.
I want to know why my colleague is so tone deaf to the real cause of inflation. If we look at every single major corporate sector that is responsible for the prices that consumers pay, we will see that the increases in costs for shipping containers, fertilizer, oil and gas, and food retail all coincide with massive corporate profit increases over the last three years. Why do the Conservatives refuse to acknowledge this? Are they that intent on running interference in this place on behalf of their corporate Bay Street friends?
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- May/21/24 6:36:10 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, I will have a chat with the member for St. Catharines later about that.
My question for the member is as follows. Conservatives have been going on for months now, talking about fuelling inflation with more, I think they called it, budget inflation. They keep talking about how inflation is going to skyrocket and get even more out of control as a result of the budget.
However, none of that happened. We have now seen four straight months where inflation has stayed within the Bank of Canada's target of 2% to 3%. Today's inflation numbers are the lowest that they have been in three years.
Why does the member continue to suggest that false narrative, that the budget is contributing to inflation, when reality suggests that he is completely wrong?
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- May/21/24 6:39:57 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, every time our Liberal friends across the way get up, they tell us how good Canadians have it. In fact, just a moment ago the member from Kingston and the Islands got up, telling us Canadians have never had it so good, and to look at inflation, it is only 2.7%.
Perhaps my colleague from Mission—Matsqui—Fraser Canyon could explain how harmful the reckless spending of the Liberal government has been, and how that spending has stoked the inflationary fires in Canada.
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- May/21/24 6:40:31 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, two weeks ago, I was on a Mission friends and neighbours Facebook site in the community of Mission, with about 25,000 community members. There was a mother on there who asked if it was just her who could not get by with $350 a week for groceries any more.
All we have to do to see the impacts of inflation is to look at the cost of food, specifically beef, and fresh fruit and vegetables. Unfortunately, due to the policies of the reckless government, fresh fruit and vegetables have become out of reach, even for the middle class.
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- May/21/24 7:42:50 p.m.
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Mr. Speaker, I listened to the member's entire speech, and the one thing I just cannot wrap my head around is how she can accuse government spending and government investing in Canadians through our budget of being inflationary.
Conservatives have been saying for months now that by the investments we are putting into Canadians and the money that we are putting into the budget, we are just going to fuel inflation. However, the opposite is true; this is the lowest that inflation has been in three years. Over the last four months, inflation has been in the target range that the Bank of Canada sets, which is between 2% and 3%. In reality, there is no rise in inflation as a result of the budget.
Does the member not recognize that what she is purporting and what the Conservatives are purporting was never actually a reality?
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- May/21/24 7:43:55 p.m.
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Mr. Speaker, I guess what the member just said explains that he does not understand the basic fundamentals of economics.
The government threw billions of dollars into the economy. As a consequence of there being more money in the economy, prices went up, and when prices go up, inflation occurs. Maybe the member has not been grocery shopping, but a pound of hamburger on sale used to be two bucks. Now, in just a few short years, if we can get it for four and a half dollars a pound we are doing well. It is inflation. He is out of touch.
What happens to bring down inflation is that interest rates are increased, and they have kept those interest rates pressuring. Now we are at the point where we are almost at zero productivity. The inflation rate being lower on a monthly basis is not necessarily a consequence of less government spending, as it is spending more, but it is a consequence of everybody's being broke.
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- May/21/24 8:29:12 p.m.
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Mr. Speaker, I appreciated the speech that was just given by my colleague, but something that she failed to articulate in her speech was the fact that the continual deficits, the massive increases in spending, are contributing to inflation. The government seems to be taking credit for inflation continuing to rise at 2.7%. That is not a decrease but simply a slowing of what has been an exceptional increase.
I would like her to comment on that, but also on the fact that the Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of Finance has announced that the government is increasing the debt ceiling for our country by $495 billion. I am wondering if the member would be able to shed some light onto why such an incredible increase in the national debt ceiling is required, in light of the circumstances that we find ourselves in, especially with the inflationary environment.
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- May/21/24 8:30:18 p.m.
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Mr. Speaker, maybe my colleague was not in the House of Commons today when the Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of Finance announced that inflation has been reduced to 2.7%, which is the lowest in three years.
There was also some good news last Thursday, that our AAA credit rating was again affirmed by Moody's, with a stable outlook, which keeps Canadians' debt payments low.
Maybe he can vote for Canadians by supporting the dental care plan, by supporting the child care benefit, and by supporting helping Canadians, helping seniors and making sure that Canadians are set up for a good future.
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- May/21/24 8:48:56 p.m.
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Mr. Speaker, I listened carefully to my colleague.
He talked about huge expenditures, massive spending, and rightly so. He also talked about inflation and how it is getting harder and harder for some people to get by, while others are lining their pockets. I may have missed it at one point or another, but I did not hear him talk about the gifts this budget gives to oil companies. I guess it is because he ran out of time. He had a lot to say.
I wanted to give him the opportunity to speak out against that, as he just did regarding other parts of this budget.
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