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Decentralized Democracy

House Hansard - 324

44th Parl. 1st Sess.
June 4, 2024 10:00AM
  • Jun/4/24 4:42:09 p.m.
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The hon. member for Calgary Shepard is rising on a point of order.
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  • Jun/4/24 5:06:46 p.m.
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Mr. Speaker, as always, it is an honour to rise in the House of Commons to speak on behalf of the constituents of Battle River—Crowfoot. I will be sharing my time with my friend, the member for Calgary Shepard. We are here debating a motion that the NDP has put forward in which it is asking for action. The NDP is asking somebody to do something, anything, to address the skyrocketing costs of food. Now, I will agree that the price of food has gone up substantially, but here we are, as the NDP stands in this place and touts that somehow it is not responsible for voting constantly in favour of the measures this government puts forward, which is causing much of that price inflation. Further, its members are asking somebody to do something. In fact, the member who just spoke, the leader of the fourth party who spoke earlier this afternoon and the party's whip are all saying that it is time to do something concrete. The tragic irony is that the motion we are debating today would truly do nothing. New Democrats are accusing the government and saying that it is time to stop asking nicely. They are accusing the Conservatives of focusing too much on the fact that taxes are causing an increase to the cost of food. What are the NDP members doing? Well, instead of proposing measures that would lower the price of food, they are throwing a temper tantrum. They are shirking the responsibility and the opportunity to actually debate and challenge the government to address some of these things. They are simply saying, while stomping their feet, that it is simply time to stop these prices from going up. The tragic irony is that it was only yesterday when that NDP member and every other left-leaning member of Parliament in this place voted against the common-sense Conservative measure that would have axed all the federal taxes on fuel to give Canadians a fuel tax holiday this summer. That member is as responsible as every member of the government for the increased costs that Canadians are facing when it comes to food. I have heard throughout the debate today a pure lack of understanding of the most basic economic principles that are driving up the price of things such as food. In fact, we hear this from the Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of Finance herself. She is celebrating the fact that inflation is now 2.7%, but that is a misnomer because, as the Liberals celebrate inflation, she says it herself that it has come down, which is misleading in every sense of the word because no costs have come down. What they are celebrating is that prices have increased dramatically, but they are just not quite increasing as quickly anymore. It is a pure example of the economic incompetence that we see in the Liberal government. Its front bench, backed up by a Liberal backbench and the New Democrats, seems to be unwilling to take into account basic economic principles. I am proud to represent a region of Alberta that has a whole host of farmers growing some of the most incredible agricultural products on the planet. My father Jay, my uncle Darren, my family friend Dale and my cousin Grainger are all in the field today planting crops. They are putting in the last of our spring planting season on the family farm and planting oats today. However, here is the reality that farmers face. They are subject to the carbon tax, but not just, as it seems the Liberals and the NDP like to suggest, on what they pay for the fuel that they put into their vehicles. No, it is much more than that. I want to share a basic economic principle here. It is that the carbon tax, by design, is meant to increase the cost of everything in order to drive consumer change. That is what the carbon tax is. Quite frankly, it was the Prime Minister who said it would never go above $50, prior to the 2019 election. After the 2019 election, all of a sudden it was that it would never go above $170. We know that some friends of the Liberals, the very same economists whom the Liberals quote and tout so often, are calling for the carbon tax to be raised to over $1,000. Can members believe that? I have asked the question directly to the Liberals, and they have refused to answer it. A basic economic principle is that a mechanism like the carbon tax drives up the cost of every part of the supply chain. From the farmer who plants, to every aspect of the agricultural operation; then the transportation of the harvested good; the storage of that good; the processing and production of whatever the secondary or tertiary product is; then the further transportation to a warehouse or further processing, or ultimately to a store or something like a grocery store or a warehouse; and then to a grocery store. The product is then sold to the consumer. Further, the consumer has to pay the carbon tax on every part of the process to purchase said product. Take a loaf of bread, for example. Consumers are paying the carbon tax on their home and on the fuel to go to the grocery store. At every single step of the supply chain, the carbon tax applies. By design, it is meant to increase costs. The Liberals have succeeded in accomplishing that objective. Further inflation in that process has had a significant impact in increased costs. What do we do about it? This is what the Leader of the Opposition, the member for Carleton, talks so often about. It is time to empower people within our country: farmers and producers, those who know how to get the job done. Let us lower costs for them. Let us make sure that we lower costs for every step of the food supply chain. As a result, we could see the price of groceries go down for Canadians. We could see Canadians save costs directly. We would see the indirect savings throughout every stage of the supply chain when it comes to food. The NDP members are acting like peacocks today. They are standing up, stomping their feet and yelling that somebody ought to do something. It is an acknowledgement, I would suggest, of what an abject failure their confidence and supply coalition agreement is with a Liberal Party that is truly not worth the cost. Conservatives have a practical plan to see costs lowered for Canadians and then, further, to make sure that we unleash the potential that exists in the Canadian economy, whether that be in energy, agriculture or manufacturing. Anything that can be done, I am confident that our country can do it. It is just that right now it is held back by an ideological Liberal-NDP government that truly does not understand the basic principles of what it is to see an economy prosper. When an economy prospers, it is the people who can benefit at every step of the process. Whether that be the producers or whether that be the buyers of the goods, when there is a free market that is functioning at its best, prosperity reigns. We can get back to that point when the member for Carleton becomes the prime minister and unleashes the true potential of our nation. That is why Conservatives are going to bring it home.
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  • Jun/4/24 5:21:13 p.m.
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Mr. Speaker, it is always an honour, obviously, to rise and speak on behalf of my constituents in Calgary Shephard. I know that the residents have seen it fit to send me back here to speak on their behalf. One of the issues that I often get emails and phone calls about is the daily cost of living. Whether it is constituents' cellphone bill, rent, mortgages or prices at the grocery stores and elsewhere, the cost of goods and services is going up, and everybody sees it all around them. A lot of that is related to decisions that were made during the pandemic. The government massively increased the monetary supply and more than doubled the national debt at the time. We know from the Auditor General and the PBO that only about $205 billion of the $600 billion in spending had nothing to do with the pandemic. There is a lot of spending there. On this opposition day that has been put forward by the NDP, I heard one member on the other side whom I want to correct. The member for Edmonton Griesbach was talking about three apples for $7. My favourite store in Calgary is the Calgary Co-op. It is a co-op with 400,000 members, and I am a member. There is no way; one would have to buy a lot of apples. I highly recommend that the member drive down from Edmonton, go to the co-op in Calgary and purchase my favourite, which is Granny Smith apples, for $1.32 for every single apple. If he buys more, he gets a discount. It is highly recommended that he do so. Again, someone can pick and choose which grocery stores they want to go to. There is choice out there. One thing I will mention is that the federal government is making it making it more expensive to shop at Calgary Co-op because the government has banned the store's fully compostable green bags, which have no plastic in them whatsoever, from being used, despite the fact that the City of Calgary worked with Calgary Co-op to create a bag that was fully compostable in the city's composting system. Even the ink does not have any plastic in it. It is not artificial. It is a completely recyclable bag. I have tabled petitions on behalf of the residents in my riding. I have spoken up on it. I have sent the minister letters on this fact, pointing out to him that the City of Calgary is one of the first movers on compostable bags in its jurisdiction, trying to address the issue of single-use plastic bags. I will say that I prefer the compostable bags. There are many residents who have emailed me, many more than I ever thought would. There is now the ridiculous situation where one has to buy the bags in a roll. The clerks are not allowed to give them out. People have to buy them from a bin right before the cash and then have their groceries bagged. They are much more expensive than they were before, and that adds to the cost of buying groceries unless one remembers to bring cloth bags or one's own other bags. Many of us forget to do so. When someone has kids and the kids are hassling them, it is very difficult to do. That is just one very small example of what happens as the cost of daily living increases. Some of the examples that they have here include the government's ordering companies to reduce prices, as if that would work, when the government is pushing up prices because the supply chains are stressed and because the monetary supply has been vastly increased. There are more dollars chasing fewer goods and services. It is as true today as it has been for decades before. I especially find it concerning that the government would introduce price caps here. Price controls have never worked in any jurisdiction. It has been attempted. It leads to rationing by suppliers and by producers, because if someone cannot get the price that it costs to make the product and to ship it, so that it can be on our store shelves, that makes them not do it. Therefore we run short of goods. This was true in western Germany. It was true well after the war. It is true in many jurisdictions for different types of goods and services when the government puts a cap on prices. It was tried in Canada in the 1970s. Famously, it was tried in the United Kingdom by a Labour government, and it led to shortages of goods and services. In the United Kingdom, the national Labour government was actually setting tax rates. The national government of the U.K., in the 1970s, set tax rates. It is reported in one of Lady Thatcher's biographies in which she wrote about her time in government. I would think on (b) in the motion, with respect to the delays in long-needed reforms to the nutrition north program. I think many of us would actually agree that reforms are needed to the program. I do not think anybody disagrees. We have had some of the prices quoted back to us as to what it costs to live in the north. I think that for me and other members who have come to be educated thanks to others who have done the research and who have put forward the numbers, this is something we would generally agree with. However, it then goes on to say, “stop Liberal and Conservative corporate handouts to big grocers.” I wonder when the NDP leader is going to talk about his brother, who lobbies for Metro. I wonder when we will have a conversation about all the big, major corporations that are so busy lobbying ministers. Some of these ministers were lobbyists before they became ministers and are now buddies with the people they were lobbying. I would like to hear more about that. In Alberta, one of the major costs and cost drivers for suppliers of produce and grocery goods on the store shelves is the carbon tax. Before the rebate, the average family in Alberta will pay $2,943. Every Alberta family will be worse off in just a few years if they are not worse off right now, on average. Consistently, many constituents are sending me their Enmax bills and Hydro One bills, which show that they are paying a lot of money, sometimes more than they use in natural gas, just on the carbon tax. I have a great love for Yiddish proverbs, and I know there are those who appreciate it when I use them. A fool says what he knows, and a wise man knows what he says. Now I can transition to what I think is the greatest foolishness: budget 2024. The $61 billion of new spending in it will only drive up the cost of our goods and services even further. This is $61 billion of new government spending that the coalition has decided to support, further driving up the prices of goods and services in Canada. It is not just me saying this. RBC says it. CIBC says it. TD says it. The big banks are reporting it. Economists are saying it. Analysts are saying consistently that if we drive up public spending and drive up public borrowing, we will crowd out private spending and private borrowing because they become more expensive and there are fewer goods to go around. In fact, RBC's budget analysis headline for federal budget 2024 was “Lack of spending restraint offset by revenue surprise and tax hikes”. This is the last thing I want to raise. We often say in this place, and I hear rhetoric from the NDP side on it, that companies are being greedy and that usually it is just profit-making. Companies are trying to earn a profit, whether it is a family company or a company that has shareholders. What about government greed? What about the government incessantly raising taxes on everyone in this country and then expecting to get as much of that revenue into its pockets as possible so it can have a Liberal green slush fund? The Liberals are so embarrassed by it that now they are going to shut it down. What about government greed and the incessant voracious appetite for tax dollars so they can be misspent, thrown away and corruptly given to consultants? This is something I do not hear the New Democrats and Liberal MPs talk about enough. We have endless examples of corruption in different government bureaucracies. The latest is the SDTC's green slush fund, which the government has admitted to and is shutting down. The government is abandoning it and trying to run away from its own board members, whom it appointed. They corruptly gave money to the corporations they ran. However, that money came from taxpayers in each of our ridings, who paid more at the end of the day. Families in my riding, as I said, pay $2,943 more in carbon tax. That does not just raise the price of groceries. It is on their utility bills and it is for the staycation they want to take. It is in all the goods they are buying for their homes. All of those costs are incurred as part of it. There are shipping costs too. There are no farms in my riding. The closest connection we have to farms in my riding is the grocery stores, and it is the same thing for seafood. That is the closest connection we have to the food chain, and when we go to grocery stores, we see prices being inflated because the shipping costs have gone up so high.
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  • Jun/4/24 11:18:49 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, I really appreciate the use of the word “co-operation”. We heard it from the member for Calgary Centre
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  • Jun/4/24 11:20:34 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, I really appreciated the words from the member for Calgary Centre in speaking about the need for co-operation in this place. If there was a day when the member was in the party that was governing at that time, could he share with us what productive co-operation would look like in this place from a governing party?
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