SoVote

Context: House Hansard - 314 - May/21/24

Mr. Garnett Genuis (Sherwood Park—Fort Saskatchewan, CPC)

May/21/24 10:19:20 a.m.
Watch

Mr. Speaker, of course, the NDP persistently ignores the role of inflation and the carbon tax in driving up the price of food and other everyday essentials for Canadians. Conservatives recognize that greed is a common part of the human condition, and this includes government greed. Bizarrely, the New Democrats think that it is only the private sector and that the government is totally immune to greed. They ignore the role that government greed plays with respect to higher taxes, higher spending, the pursuit of ever-greater government control and how that is making life more unaffordable under the NDP-Liberal coalition. We hear a lot about specific grocery companies but almost nothing about Metro, which is one major grocery company in this country. Does the NDP member think the lack of mention of Metro by the NDP has anything to do with the fact that its leader's brother is a lobbyist for Metro?

155 words

Context: House Hansard - 314 - May/21/24

Mr. Philip Lawrence (Northumberland—Peterborough South, CPC)

May/21/24 10:34:30 a.m.
Watch

Mr. Speaker, I am wondering whether the member would like to comment on the fact that the brother of the leader of the NDP is a lobbyist from Metro and that in fact its profits have actually outstripped those of Loblaw. Metro is at 4.6%, whereas Loblaw is at 3.4%. Is that just a coincidence?

57 words

Context: House Hansard - 314 - May/21/24

Mr. Philip Lawrence (Northumberland—Peterborough South, CPC)

May/21/24 11:19:23 a.m.
Watch

Madam Speaker, I do not think it has ever been said in the House of Commons that this place is lacking hypocrisy. There is usually enough hypocrisy in this place to go around, but the motion brought to us by the NDP is just abounding. It is even overflowing. It is even too much hypocrisy for the House of Commons, which has certainly seen enough of it in our history. The NDP is talking about corporate greed and grocery prices. Meanwhile, the leader of the NDP's brother, Mr. Singh, is a lobbyist for Metro. I could not believe that the NDP member who rose with respect to the motion actually mentioned the fact. He gave away the story when he said that the most profitable large grocery chain in Canada was Metro. This is the firm that for which the brother of NDP leader lobbies. Therefore, no one is making more money. No one is profiting more from a grocery perspective than Metro, the company for which the brother of the leader of the NDP, Mr. Singh, lobbies. It is unbelievable, the hypocrisy and the chutzpah to bring this into the House, to go forward with the fact that somehow they do not have any responsibility. Meanwhile, as the member for Peterborough—Kawartha just said, the current government is the longest surviving minority government in Canadian history. The NDP-Liberal government has continued to prop this up, so we have seen this record profit under the NDP-Liberal government. It is not a Conservative government in power. We are seeing these record profits of these grocers under the NDP-Liberal government. Therefore, we have more hypocrisy. However, let me back up and explain why this might be happening. The reality is that socialism fails every time it is tried. Of course, we are all aware of the tremendous failures, the suffering and the millions who died during the Soviet Union. We have seen the suffering in Cuba and Venezuela. However, I want to bring three concrete examples of where socialism has failed. One is the U.K. After World War II, it embraced socialism. It went full hog into socialism. It nationalized nearly every major industry. What happened? Initially it was not that bad, but then Margaret Thatcher's old adage came into being, “eventually you run out of other peoples' money.” That is the problem with socialism. The United Kingdom became known as the sick man of Europe, because its economy was so behind, which brought the standard of living down further and further until Margaret Thatcher came to office, brought free economics, and brought the U.K. back on the economic road map. The second example is an interesting one, Israel. Israel also embraced socialist policies shortly after World War II. It embraced very socialist collectivized farming. Some members might be familiar with the term “kibbutz”. These were socialist farming agricultural places. Initially, it was not bad, because they were carrying this money that had come from before. They were initially spending their money, so they grew debt. However, what happened was that Israel's economy began to shrink and shrink badly. In fact, it was not until around 1980 or so that eventually it adopted free market policies and went from one of the lower economic growth countries to leading the developed world, from 2000 on, in economic growth. Once again, we see socialism fail. A third example is the world's biggest democracy, India. India initially, after World War II, also embraced socialist policies and once again found it to be an unmitigated disaster, lowering the standard of living. Then, it embraced a free market economy and, lo and behold, the market increased. This is repeated all over again. What is happening in Canada is not new news. We had the Liberal government take power in 2015. The Liberals were coming off a great legacy of the Harper government, when housing was affordable, when Canada was a world leader in GDP per capita and when Canada was strong on the map. Then time went by and the debt, the leveraging and socialist policies had their corrosive effect on the economy over and over again, bringing down our economy. Then a realization happened. I do not know whether it happens for all the members; maybe some of them live in blissful ignorance or just deny the truth. However, the reality is that eventually it comes to the effect that these policies do not work. We are seeing that now in Canada, just like we did in the U.K., Israel and India. Wherever there are these socialist policies, a legacy always follows. First is high unemployment; we are now creeping up to 6.1%. Second is a lack of prosperity. Third is an increase in inequality ironically enough, given all the talk of equality in the House. Fourth is incredibly slow economic growth, which drives down the economy and economic life. For the folks who are in government, the challenge then becomes this. They see that their policies have created nothing but failure. What do they have to do? They have to create a bogeyman. They have a straw-man argument and they have to place the blame on something else. They divide, as they did during COVID, and they distract. They will do everything possible to not look at their record. That is what is going on here. We have seen the NDP leader, whose brother is a lobbyist for Metro, the large chain with the largest profit margin of all Canadian grocers, out there blaming big grocers. I am not saying Metro is innocent; it is certainly not. However, the hypocrisy of that party to go after grocery chains when the leader's brother is a lobbyist for Metro, the most profitable large grocery chain in Canada, is unbelievable. With that, I would like to bring an amendment to the motion. I move: That the motion be amended by deleting all the words after the word “That” and substituting the following: the 19th report of the Standing Committee on Finance, presented on Monday, May 6, 2024, be not now concurred in, but that it be recommitted to the Standing Committee on Finance with instruction that it amend the same so as to recommend a more efficient alternative to address food insecurity among Canadians this summer by calling on the government to eliminate the carbon tax, the federal fuel tax, and GST on gasoline and diesel between now and Labour Day.

1093 words

Context: House Hansard - 314 - May/21/24

Mr. Ryan Williams (Bay of Quinte, CPC)

May/21/24 11:30:20 a.m.
Watch

Madam Speaker, the member talked about the leader of the NDP and his brother who is with Metro. We always wonder why we do not hear about Metro in here. We hear about Loblaws all the time. However, the government is equally as complicit in grocery prices. Last October, the minister of innovation stated that grocery prices would come down in a matter of weeks or months. The government passed and received royal assent, on December 15, 2023, on the Affordable Housing and Groceries Act. The government has an act called “affordable groceries”, which was passed on December 15. I wonder if the member would comment on this. Have grocery prices gone down? Has the government done anything at all to lower grocery prices?

126 words