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Results: 91 - 105 of 129
View Erin O'Toole Profile
CPC (ON)
View Erin O'Toole Profile
2021-05-25 14:21 [p.7317]
Mr. Speaker, everything is getting more expensive under the current Liberal government. Inflation powered through the government's target to a 10-year high. We now have proof: Lumber, houses and even food are increasingly expensive. Life is more expensive. That is a fact.
How much is the government's poor management going to cost Canadians?
View Justin Trudeau Profile
Lib. (QC)
View Justin Trudeau Profile
2021-05-25 14:22 [p.7317]
Mr. Speaker, from the beginning of this pandemic, we promised Canadians that we would have their backs, however long the pandemic lasted. That is exactly what we did with the Canada emergency response benefit, support for businesses, the Canada emergency business account, and support for seniors and youth.
We have been there to support Canadians, as we have been doing for six years. The reality is that the Conservatives continue to vote against our measures to help Canadians, whether it is the tax cut for the middle class and the tax increase for the wealthy that we implemented when we first came to power, or the work we continue to do to present an ambitious budget for Canadians.
View Nelly Shin Profile
CPC (BC)
View Nelly Shin Profile
2021-05-25 16:48 [p.7339]
Mr. Speaker, Canadians have waited a long time for the budget. The last one was tabled in March 2019. The absence of a budget in 2020 is a little bizarre, but here we are with budget 2021.
Having a well-planned budget in this pandemic environment is critical because it is like a compass that can help us find our way out of the wilderness. Canadians are distressed by the pandemic. They want a sense of assurance that the government has a plan to help us move forward toward recovery. Families have tragically lost their parents and grandparents to COVID-19 outbreaks in care homes. Social isolation has exacerbated domestic violence and challenged women from being able to reach out for help or leave their abusive partners. Businesses have been crushed. Entire sectors are hanging by a thread. Addictions and suicides have escalated. COVID-19 has stubbornly held our lives, institutions and finances hostage for long enough. The trauma that Canadians have been facing throughout the pandemic has been daunting, and Canadians need hope.
Our country needs a budget that mirrors a plan for recovery, job creation and long-term growth. Canadians are waiting for a practical plan. Unfortunately, budget 2021 seems like a déjà vu of the original COVID-19 emergency benefits that required many hands from opposition parties to fix so that more than just a select number of people would qualify for the announced supports.
While the budget appears benevolent in its parts, as a whole, when examined, it lacks foresight and at times transparency and clarity. According to the Parliamentary Budget Officer's May 5 report, a good portion of the recovery-plan spending will not actually be used to stimulate the economy, but is presented as such. Furthermore, the government's projections on growth are inflated. About $24.7 billion in spending from the fall economic statement was already in the economy and accounted for in the figures present when the budget was being written, and much of the $101.4 billion in spending proposed by the budget was already accounted for in the private sector growth projections. It would appear the Liberal government wanted to overstate its generosity.
Furthermore, the increase in jobs, according to the PBO, would grow from 39,000 to 74,000 to 94,000 jobs from 2021 to 2024, while according to budget 2021, the employment growth from the recovery plan would evolve from 315,000 to 334,000 to 280,000 jobs in that period. The PBO report captures this discrepancy in the statement, “Finance Canada’s impact assessment of the Recovery Plan overstates the economic impact of stimulus spending in Budget 2021.”
When it comes to balancing the budget, we experienced yet another déjà vu. The PBO states:
...the Government has decided to effectively stabilize the federal debt ratio at a higher level, potentially exhausting its fiscal room over the medium- and long-term. This means that any substantial new permanent spending would either lead to a higher debt-to-GDP ratio or have to be financed through higher revenues and/or spending reductions in other areas.
Therefore, the next time we have a crisis, who or what are we going to sacrifice? We will have very little reserve to work with.
He also says, “Long-term projections presented in the budget also show the federal debt ratio remaining above its pre-pandemic level through 2055.” In other words, the government does not plan on returning our deficits to at least the pre-pandemic levels.
The Liberal government has left no fiscal room to make future investments and it has no intention to get out of debt. Prolonged deficit spending will bring an inflation hike. We are experiencing this already, with increases in the prices of groceries, lumber, housing and gas. What kind of future does this leave for our country, for our children? Budget 2021 needs a reality check into the future.
The unprecedented needs during the pandemic called for spending from the government to sustain individuals, families and businesses in a temporary time of crisis. The pandemic is a temporary crisis. We are still going through it, but it is supposed to be temporary. We do not need to make it permanent with poor planning or no planning. The deficit will not replenish itself.
As parliamentarians, we need to listen, analyze, process and respond to the needs of Canadians with the foresight of visionaries, the thoughtfulness of problem solvers and the focus and integrity of conscientious leaders who have a plan and purpose greater than ourselves. This is what our constituents expect of us and deserve. However, this budget instead looks like a patchwork of short-sighted, reactionary, electorally driven promises that will leave our country with a larger debt, more deficits and more government interference. Again, the budget strangely feels like déjà vu.
Happily for the Liberals, they have gotten away with the way they have been operating for a long time. However, tragically for Canadians, the government's short-sighted haphazard leadership, which is also reflected in this budget, has delayed our country's path to recovery and has allowed greater plight for businesses and the mental health of Canadians.
Vaccinations were a key part to a swifter path toward recovery, but poor decisions on vaccinations delayed that and caused the third wave of lockdowns. In the business world, this has translated to more losses and fewer reserves to bounce back. Each wave and each lockdown tests the patience of reasonable Canadians, who have been faithfully following COVID-19 regulations for the safety of all.
The CanSino deal between the Liberal government and the Chinese company was blocked by China's communist regime and ended Canada's would-be first procurement of vaccines. This process occurred from May to July last year, when insolvency of businesses was climbing to a peak, and Canadians were gripped with shock and fear. At our most vulnerable stage of crisis, the Prime Minister gambled the health and well-being of our nation on working with a communist regime. I would be curious to know from the Prime Minister's why pursuing this risk took precedence over the lives of Canadians.
Given the Liberals' bad track record when it comes to timely procurement, does the budget reflect a realistic vaccination recovery timeline? Given the extension of the ideal three-week gap between doses that Canadians will receive, the possibility of having to mix vaccines for first-time AstraZeneca recipients and the yet-to-be-confirmed date for the next delivery of Moderna vaccines for second doses, how will the government's abysmal rollout of vaccines impact the effectiveness of the budget?
Our future is uncertain because the government is unpredictable and follows its own convenient electoral clock. How will any efficacy issues outside the government's anticipated success of the vaccinations impact the effectiveness of the budget? Our future is uncertain because the government is unpredictable and follows its own convenient clock.
I would like to speak now on one of the hardest-hit sectors, travel and tourism, which was the first to shut down and will likely require the longest time to reboot. British Columbia's tourism revenue in 2019 was $22.3 billion. The tourism sector provided 149,900 jobs in B.C. The hotels in my riding are dependent on the overflow of the success of tourism in Vancouver at large. Their revenue continues to be tested.
A group of Korean business owners in downtown Vancouver who are also dependent on the tourism sector for their livelihoods reached out to my office to express their struggle. They are primarily owners of small restaurants and convenience stores that are dependent on tourist seasons. They have suffered due to low foot traffic of tourists from international flights and cruise ships.
Because of high commercial rental prices in the downtown corridor, they have been unable to hire employees and are run instead by husband and wife owners. They also have relatively low non-deferrable business expenses that do not meet the $40,000 minimum, therefore they do not qualified for CEBA. They continue to struggle without support. Their recovery will be dependent on the recovery of the travel and tourism sector, which will probably be the last industry to recover.
Where is the support for these small ma-and-pa shops? Will they continue to be left behind? How is the government going to ensure these business owners will make it through?
The President of the United States has told American cruise ships to skip docking in Vancouver because the Prime Minister continues to show no sign of reasonable and safe reopening. The independent travel advisers in Port Moody—Coquitlam and across Canada are concerned and feel left out. They have continued working through cancellations without pay and with clawed back commissions, which are now just starting to get sorted out. Simultaneously, if they were to start booking clients, they would not see commissions for a long time.
Most of them are women, and they are only eligible for CRB. As the travel industry does not anticipate most people will make travel plans until 2022-2023, even though the travel restrictions will be lifted, and their income will be hurt greatly. They need sector-specific help that will support them until the travel and tourism industry operates again. All of this is dependent on the efficacy of vaccinations and safe reopening.
Business owners generally do not want to depend on government assistance in the long term. They want to succeed on the merit of their entrepreneurial excellence and hard work. What they really want to see is for the government to implement a plan to safely reopen. This will let them prosper, and it will create jobs.
They cannot handle one more lockdown. Canadians are moving their businesses from our country to the U.S. because we are so behind in our reopening. A constituent in Port Moody has done just that.
Canadians are waiting for a plan to reopen. Where is it? They are depending on us to give them hope and a pathway to a sustainable future. I hope we will find a way to do just that.
View Corey Tochor Profile
CPC (SK)
View Corey Tochor Profile
2021-05-25 17:46 [p.7348]
Madam Speaker, it is a great honour to enter into debate today on the budget. I would like to share my thoughts and what I am hearing from the people who I represent about how disappointed they are.
They are disappointed that this budget, two years late, has nothing in it to get our economy back and rolling again. It is immensely frustrating, coming from Saskatchewan, to see that, if we look at the sectors that have been ignored over the years by the Liberals, this has continued with this budget. It is frustrating because of what this budget would do for future generations, or what it unfortunately would not do.
It is a budget that unfortunately adds more debt. The Prime Minister will add more debt than all other prime ministers in the history of Canada combined, which is a shocking amount of money, and we are going to have to pay that back. It is generational theft that is occurring here.
Another great concern of mine is how the Liberals are paying for this debt or how they are accounting for it. It has been commented on that in our history regimes around the world have tried to print money to get out of the fiscal issues those countries were facing. Those regimes in other parts of the world all failed, and they failed miserably. They failed their society and their citizens because of what printing money ultimately does. When we print money, additional currency enters into the system, which means existing money is worth less, and that ultimately leads to inflation. We are already seeing this.
When I meet with seniors, they are mostly concerned about the cost of living. When I meet with young families, it is the cost of living they are concerned about. This is combined with professionals who are concerned there will be to be fewer opportunities for them or their children because of the decisions that are being made right now in Ottawa.
On that backdrop is the item I am most concerned with. Once we create this inflation by printing currency, and that is what the Liberals would be doing, the government will attempt to tap it down by measures, which are usually interest rate increases. That would have a cascading effect throughout our country. It would have a cascading effect on other levels of government. Consumers and citizens who are just holding on by the skin of their teeth right now are paying record low interest rates, which we know will rise because of inflationary pressures to combat those effects.
What we would have is an effect of layering on misery with citizens. That mortgage payment for families that are just scraping by right now would be increasing. For anyone who has personal debt, that would be increasing. What choices are those families going to be making because of this budget? I shudder to think what the country would look like.
Let us examine what will happen to other levels of government. The provinces are all running deficits throughout Canada, and some of them are near record deficits because there is a pandemic going on. There are all hands on deck, and we need that to get through this pandemic. Conservatives have been very clear that we support short-term emergency relief, but what we would be getting out of this budget is much more, unfortunately.
The provinces are fighting this pandemic with everything they have and any extra dollars they may have are going into health care. That is probably the most disrespectful and shocking part of this budget. Not one thin cent is going to health transfers to the provinces. We have the provinces on the front line paying for nurses, doctors and everything that goes along with providing health care, and there is not one additional dollar in health transfers from the federal government to the provinces, which are on the front line of this pandemic.
If we go a step further, we are hopefully rounding a corner, but we are severely lacking second doses in Canada. We are 50th out of 70 countries when we look at fully vaccinated people. It is a mammoth mistake that the government has done such a poor job of procuring vaccines for our citizens, worse than any other G7 country in the world.
Another unfortunate aspect of this pandemic is that a lot of health care has been delayed. We know that diagnoses of cancers have been delayed, and that one is quite scary for me. We all know that health outcomes, especially with cancer, improve with early diagnosis. If we push back diagnoses, what does it mean for patients and families?
Let us also consider the elective surgeries that have been pushed back. Other health concerns out there are not getting attention right now in our health care system because every additional dollar in capacity is going to fight this pandemic, and the feds are nowhere.
There is not $1 in health transfer increases this year. They all point out that they are paying for the vaccines and PPE. Of the contracts we are aware of that we have paid for as a country, we paid a premium for slow delivery. We can see the slow delivery in the world.
Now that we are into the playoffs, I hope we are all taking a bit of a breather from our schedules to watch a little hockey. If we turn on the highlights of the teams in the states, because their government procured enough vaccines, they have fans in the stands. This is compared to the stark reality of arenas in Canada that lay empty. The excitement is there, but there are no fans. That is all at the feet of the federal government failing to procure enough vaccines.
Even the aspects the federal government is responsible for, it has failed us. It failed us in getting enough vaccines. Of the contracts we are aware of, we paid a premium for late delivery. One has to ask why that is. Was it the three months wasted at the start of the pandemic when it was negotiating with the Chinese Communist government for vaccines? Why did we pay a premium? Were we late in the negotiations and other countries already had their orders in?
I have never heard a reason for us paying this premium. I am not against paying a premium for vaccines if we have them already. The delay of getting them into the country means the lockdowns and economic hurt is going to continue. That is most disappointing to the people of Saskatchewan.
The VIDO centre in Saskatoon did receive some funding. Members may remember that facility was the first in the world that isolated COVID-19. The leading scientists and doctors working on this vaccine are in Saskatoon, and they isolated COVID-19 first among all other countries in the world. It is a renowned centre. Within days, if not weeks, after isolating it, it had a prototype for a vaccine.
One of the most frustrating days as a member of Parliament was meeting with its representatives. They asked the federal government for additional dollars and they had to wait for the budget before getting the dollars. We are in the middle of an emergency—
View Scot Davidson Profile
CPC (ON)
View Scot Davidson Profile
2021-05-14 12:03 [p.7244]
Madam Speaker, clearly no one in the Liberal government has had to buy a two-by-four lately. Even the most essential items have become unaffordable, like plywood to fix a roof or food to go on the barbecue. It is unbelievable. The Liberals' out-of-control spending is putting inflationary pressures on the middle class, students and seniors, who are struggling just to make ends meet.
Why is the Liberal government forcing working Canadians to pay a hidden tax through growing inflation and the rising cost of living?
View Sean Fraser Profile
Lib. (NS)
View Sean Fraser Profile
2021-05-14 12:04 [p.7244]
Madam Speaker, with respect to the hon. member's assertion, I would point him to the testimony of the Governor of the Bank of Canada, who appeared before the finance committee and explained in clear terms that the inflation we have seen in the Canadian economy is precisely where he predicted it would be and is well within the 1% to 3% goal.
I would remind the hon. member, however, that his solution to this problem, to stop government spending, would result in the government removing essential benefits that are helping support families and businesses in their time of need. Canadians can rest assured that our government will be there for them, as long as it takes, no matter what it takes, unlike the Conservatives.
View John McKay Profile
Lib. (ON)
Mr. Speaker, people are starting to be cautiously hopeful. As vaccines roll out and we approach herd immunity, Canadians can dream, once again, of something approaching normality. What the new normal might be is, of course, anyone's guess. However, some people are starting to turn to thinking about how we are going to pay for the debts and deficits that have been necessarily incurred over the course of the last 14 months. Some 74% of Canadians are worried about the budget deficit, and it is a legitimate worry.
The government rightly injected billions of dollars into the economy. Looking at the charts in this 700-page budget, much of the money is sitting in Canadian savings accounts. I perceive that to be a good thing. Canadians have been notorious under-savers, more spenders than savers, but now, not quite so much.
Chart 22 in the budget shows that 8% of nominal GDP, year over year, has been put into savings accounts. That is a huge amount of money. It is such a huge amount of money that it will be looking for spending opportunities as we emerge from the pandemic. As it says in the budget documents, it may well become a bit of a tailwind to the economy.
However, what happens when significant excess money is released into the economy, money looking for places to be spent, generally speaking prices go up. Labour becomes more expensive, the cost of goods and services climbs and people's savings do not get them as much as before. Then we have another problem, and that is called inflation.
An article in The Globe and Mail caught my eye the other day. It was about the perceived mismatch between the consumer price index, CPI, and people's lived experience. The price of shelter rose 2.4% last year, which was consistent with the CPI of 2.2%, well within the Bank of Canada's inflationary band. Meanwhile, the average resale price of a home went up 32%. This is a mismatch between people's lived experience and the official numbers. As one commentator put it:
That leads to a cost-of-living indicator that doesn't quite reflect what consumers see and feel, and an inflation indicator that doesn't quite reflect the long-term cost of owned housing relative to other things we buy....To that point, there is a consistent mismatch between CPI inflation as Statscan measures it and how Canadians typically perceive inflation.
The article goes on in great detail as to the various means to measure inflation, a quite academic debate which I will spare the House.
However, in an online survey conducted by the Bank of Canada last year, 55% of the respondents said that 2% inflation was not a realistic representation of their experience of inflation, while 66% of respondents believed that the inflation in Canada was generally higher than 2%. All of the budgetary calculations are based upon a range of 2% to 3% inflation and a clear determination by the Bank of Canada to keep interest rates very low. The Governor of the Bank of Canada has repeated himself several times on that point.
The reason that Canadians are concerned about the size of the deficit is the fear that it will become overwhelmingly expensive to the detriment of other initiatives if inflation takes off and therefore interest rates take off. On the present consensus of numbers generated by the absolute best economists in Canada, Canada can afford a very large deficit and debt-to-GDP ratio.
Historically, we have been here before. Post-World War II, we had a debt-to-GDP ratio in the neighbourhood of 116% and, in 1995, we were named an honorary member of the Third World. At the time, we had a 67% debt to GDP. By virtue of economic expansion and some prudent measures, we were able to deal with those situations, and they were worse than what we are presently experiencing, which is a debt-to-GDP ratio around 50%, give or take, projected forward for the next five years.
However, there is a lingering doubt that the CPI does not quite get the picture right, not on housing, not on shelter, not on food, not on lumber, not on steel, not on cement. In this morning's Globe and Mail, the article entitled, “Copper hits record high”, is a commentary on the rise of the price of copper, which is used for everything, from plumbing to electricity to alternative energy as well as Chinese supply-side jitters and accommodating monetary policy, which is motivating companies to ramp up spending.
Virginia-based trader, Dennis Gartman, said, “The monetary authorities, whether it’s the Fed, the Bank of Canada, the Bank of Japan, the Bank of England, have all been extraordinarily expansionary. Copper, lead, zinc, aluminum, tin, iron ore, steel, are telling you something’s going on in the global economy.” He added, “This is inflationary, and this is more than transitory circumstances. This is secular in nature.” This is where it might end badly.
I started by talking about Canadians having massive amounts of money in their savings accounts, some of which will go to feed a pent-up demand. What will happen if Canadians go to spend their money and inflation has eroded their pandemic savings account? It will create a lot of very unhappy and upset Canadians. As the great philosopher, Wayne Gretzky, once said. one should go to “where the puck is going, not where it has been.” There are indications out there where the puck is going to inflation and if it goes to inflation, we will have yet another problem.
I commend the government on its handling of the pandemic finances thus far, but we, as Canadians, need to recognize that the inflationary pressures are there. How we handle them will largely determine how we get through this period of “normalcy”.
View Pat Kelly Profile
CPC (AB)
View Pat Kelly Profile
2021-05-11 10:58 [p.7027]
Madam Speaker, this is the type of debate we need, where we discuss important issues before the House, and inflation and his concern about it should be duly noted.
I am very pleased to hear the member raise inflation. At finance committee, for example, the testimony from officials and members of the government, members of his caucus, has largely not shared the urgency around getting a handle on ensuring that inflation does not harm Canadians in the months and years to come. The lived experience tells Canadians that prices on the critical things they need have gone up, like heating homes, rent and the price of a home, which has gone up 30% across Canada during the pandemic. I would ask the member continue with his concern on inflation.
View John McKay Profile
Lib. (ON)
Madam Speaker, I am glad to hear that the finance committee is actually debating this issue.
I do not profess to be a world-leading economist, but I have lived through the stagflation of the 1970s, the erosion of people's savings and the mismatch between what inflation was doing to their assets and to their income.
The issue is whether the CPI is actually measuring the right things. The argument is that the CPI measures the Canadian economy well and its inflation well during non-pandemic times, but during a pandemic, it may not be measuring quite the right things. This an interesting debate and I hope the finance committee carries on with that.
View Ziad Aboultaif Profile
CPC (AB)
View Ziad Aboultaif Profile
2021-05-11 16:02 [p.7072]
Mr. Speaker, I want to start my speech with a single line: Mr. Speaker, I told you so.
I mean no disrespect, but about a month ago, in mid-April, I said that I would not be surprised if Bill C-14 would not go through the other place by the time we got our hands on this 2021-22 budget. Obviously, I was right. To make it even better, Bill C-14 has not been returned to us and it has been a month since I made that prediction. However, I am not here to speak to Bill C-14.
I am here to speak to another bill. It would spend a lot of money. It would massively increase our national debt and it would not do a whole lot to help Canadians. I am going to be speaking to Bill C-30 because, like I said, this budget would spend a lot of money: $154.7 billion. Even if Bill Gates were to liquidate his entire net worth, that still would not be enough to cover the bill for this. I want to talk about all of this money.
If my colleagues here would think back to last year, when this finance minister started her current portfolio, she was very eager to bring Canada's fiscal firepower to bear if September's throne speech is to be believed. However, there is a bit of a problem with that. This is not Hollywood. We can run out of ammo. Our barrels can overheat. We need some way to not burn through all this firepower too fast or, in other terms, we need some sort of fiscal anchor.
Why do we need a fiscal anchor? Fiscal anchors serve as notional ceilings or caps to the levels of public spending, deficits and debt that governments are prepared to reach in their fiscal policy. They serve many purposes: one, retaining the confidence of lenders and global markets, like credit access and favourable rates; two, establishing a positive investment climate for businesses; and, three, providing a measure of fiscal discipline inside government. If the finance minister does not have one, it becomes very difficult for her to put any sort of constraints on her colleagues in cabinet and caucus, and ensure that the government has the ability to respond to future economic shocks and unforeseen crises.
Before COVID-19, the current government's fiscal anchor was to decrease the debt-to-GDP ratio. That anchor has disappeared. Now the budget has one, a vague, pretty useless one. Great, they are committed to reducing the debt, but the fiscal anchor is supposed to be a prudent, specific debt target, not “we will lower it over the medium term”. Fiscal anchors need to be a target that people can use to hold the government to account with no vague statements.
It is clear that this budget does not have a fiscal anchor. It is clear that this is just written in there to hide the Liberals' lack of future planning. What kinds of fiscal anchors could the government have used? I am not talking about that vague, literally, one line that is in the budget.
The first one is the debt-to-GDP ratio. This is what the Liberals would clearly claim they have got right now, but, again, they need targets and accountability, not vague statements and no accountability. A good example would be keeping the debt-to-GDP ratio under 30%. Any of my colleagues here may remember that as Bill Morneau's favourite target. The so-called anchor in the budget says it wants to reduce the debt-to-GDP ratio, but it does not provide a goal or a target. Therefore, when debt to GDP is at nearly 50%, a reduction is pretty easy to do, but whether the reduction is effective is another matter.
Another anchor the government could be using is something like the deficit-to-GDP ratio. Again, they have a one-off section about this one, simply saying that the government will reduce COVID spending. Great, but what about other spending? This budget introduces a lot of spending, permanent spending, including stuff like made-in-Ottawa child care programs and made-in-Ottawa pharmacare. This is a lot of new permanent program spending, and these are just small drops in the bucket.
The PBO found that the purported growth spending in the budget would only produce a fraction of the government growth that the government said it would. Therefore, the PBO found that with 1% growth on 74,000 jobs, $100 billion would result in over $1 million per job.
If keeping the deficit-to-GDP ratio down is one of this budget’s fiscal anchors, why would the government spend so much money frivolously? In all honesty, had I asked that in question period, I would have received the government's famous non-answer, which is disappointing.
Since we both know that it will not answer, I will tell the House what the real reason is that the federal government wants to spend this avalanche of cash. It is an election budget. That is why there is a lot of growth funding that would not cause growth. There are no productivity measures, and there is nothing to address Canada’s uncompetitive regulatory regime. It is just a lot of money for programs that look good in a nice, red-covered election platform with a big L on the front of it.
What really, deeply worries me is that the government does not seem to care about what all of this purposeless spending will cause. It is not just from this budget, but all of the previous ones too. The government has spent more than all previous prime ministers in the history of Canada combined. At this point, the government is spending so much that our grandkids, if not our great-grandkids, will still be paying it off. It is like taking out a credit card in their names, maxing it out, and leaving it for them to deal with.
As with actual credit cards, the interest rate is critical to this. I know that the minister would say, “Oh, it’s fine, the interest rate is low so we can borrow easily,” a quote from the minister, but again, our national debt is like a credit card. If there is even a one-percentage-point jump in the interest rate, that is another $10 billion per year in debt-servicing costs. Just like with credit cards, the interest can go up if we do not pay down our debts.
What if another massive crisis comes up, and we end up spending another few hundred billion dollars? Our creditors might start wanting us to pay the money back, and it will be tougher for that future government if it needs to borrow money during that crisis.
We also have to consider inflation. What if inflation goes up in the future? Right now, the Bank of Canada has the inflation rate at 2.2%. I know they like it around 2%, but what if the inflation rate keeps increasing? If we keep injecting all this money into the economy, it could cause inflation to spike.
Consider if inflation rose to 5%. Everything would cost more, which is a normal practice, and the value of our currency would drop by 5% year after year. That might not sound like much, but it would add up if it went on like that for a decade.
I am sure all of us who are old enough to remember the 80s and 90s will remember that it was not pretty stuff. Most of us are only a decade or so out from retirement and we will all get good pensions, but not all Canadians will.
My kids are in their early twenties, and I know a lot of our colleagues have kids who are younger than that. Do we really want to leave this fiscal mess in their laps, or in our grandchildren's laps? I know that I do not.
Our legacy should be having rebuilt Canada with a strong, competitive economy that will be there for decades to come, not spending our money for no purpose other than to help the government win an election. We need to spend within our means, not outside of our means, our kids' means and our grandkids' means.
View Larry Maguire Profile
CPC (MB)
View Larry Maguire Profile
2021-05-11 16:33 [p.7077]
Mr. Speaker, for those following the debate on this budget implementation act, I will provide the necessary context for how we ended up with the most expensive federal budget in our lifetime.
It is imperative that we as legislators look at the full picture and to the future when debating a bill like this. Right now in Canada there are countless families and businesses on the brink of losing everything they have. The recent job numbers are horrendous, as our economy shed another 207,000 positions and our unemployment rate is 8.1%. These are not just numbers and statistics; they are people's livelihoods and careers. Many of these jobs were in the service and retail industry. These workers now find themselves without a pay cheque and some fear their jobs will never come back.
Every single constituency has been hit hard. All we have to do is look at the empty storefronts and vacant buildings to understand the severity of the economic and health crisis our country is facing.
We are now in the third wave and my province of Manitoba is back in lockdown. We are not unique as every province is in a race to stop the spread of COVID variants. While other nations have done a tremendous job of procuring enough vaccines for the first quarter of 2021, which helped them to mitigate against the third wave, we, in Canada, have not been so fortunate. We find ourselves in this terrible position due to a series of failures.
For my Liberal colleagues who might not take my word, I only need to point to the recent Auditor General's report that proved beyond a reasonable doubt that the government was woefully unprepared for the pandemic. My Liberal colleagues could also review the speech given by the member for Kingston and the Islands when he admitted, “if vaccines came sooner we probably would not be standing in this place right now,” which was in response to the emergency debate that took place just last week. For once in my parliamentary career I can say that I agree with my hon. Liberal colleague.
I do not plan on litigating everything that has happened to date. For the purposes of this debate, it must be said that if we were able to procure enough vaccines for the first quarter of 2021, we would be in a far better position than we find ourselves today. If the government had moved quickly to shutdown flights from countries, where the variants are out of control, it would certainly have helped limit the spread of these variants. Not only has those failures cost people's lives, but it has resulted in prolonging the pandemic.
There is a direct correlation between those failures and their direct impact on our economy and the nation's finances. Within this omnibus bill, the government has acknowledged that the pandemic will continue for quite some time.
It is clear that the government needs to extend the programs on which many businesses and companies are relying, as either their doors are now locked or they are operating with very limited capacity. Just because the doors are closed, though, does not mean the bills do not continue to pile up. To no fault of their own, businesses and their employees are paying the price of the federal government's failure of not procuring enough vaccines for the first quarter of 2021 and for failing to keep the variants out of our country, and certainly for the lack of distribution of the same.
The last thing people want to do is to continue to apply for more financial support, but they do not have a choice. They cannot afford to go through another lockdown and they need to pay their bills. Therefore, I support those very specific clauses in the legislation to extend these programs. In fact, there are other specific measures I support, but in a bill as lengthy as this one, there are bound to be a few things that every member can get behind.
The road ahead of us is paved with uncertainties and risks, so we are already seeing the unintended consequences of the government's policies. The first risk is the very real threat of inflation. The Bank of Canada recently sent out a warning to investors that rising inflation numbers could result in it hiking the interest rate. If we couple that with the recent report that close to half of Canadians are $200 or less away from not being able to cover their bills and debt payments at the end of each month, that should keep every member of Parliament up at night.
If we look at the skyrocketing housing prices, we are witnessing in real time the dream of home ownership slipping away. I shudder at the thought of what is going to happen to those who will have to remortgage their homes at a much higher interest rate.
The second threat is the growing size of our country's debt and the cost to service that debt, as was mentioned by many of my colleagues. I know that every government must grapple with making choices and setting priorities, but I fear there are some who cannot see the forest for the trees. In a perfect world, every government has the financial capacity to carry out its mandate, but we do not live in that utopia where everything can get funded all at once. The size of this deficit makes one wonder who got left out.
Last week, the Parliamentary Budget Officer issued his analysis of the budget. He projects that the ratio of federal debt to gross domestic product will hit 52.1% this year and remain well above the pre-pandemic level of 31.2% for quite some time. In the report, there was another startling number that deserves repeating. The long-term projections presented in the budget show the federal debt-to-GDP ratio remaining above its pre-pandemic level through to the year 2055. That is a staggering 34 years from now. I doubt that I will witness the momentous occasion when the Government of Canada returns to pre-pandemic debt numbers, but my grandchildren and their families will most certainly be stuck with the bill, and that bill right now is that the average Canadian family owes over $77,000 in federal debt.
Any time a government goes this far into debt, it is completely irresponsible to not have a road map or a plan to get its fiscal house back in order. The interest payments alone on our debt are expected to hit almost $40 billion a year in the next few years. For my Liberal colleagues who do not share the same hesitations about their spendthrift ways, I will quote Paul Martin, who was a long-serving Liberal finance minister. He said, “The debt and the deficit are not inventions of ideology. They are facts of arithmetic. The quicksand of compound interest is real.” He said those words over 20 years ago and they still ring true. It would seem that modern monetary theory has found a receptive audience within the government.
I want to reference Jonathan Hartley, an economics researcher, who recently wrote about the pitfalls of this new economic model being touted by the left-of-centre politicians. He said, “The defining feature of [modern monetary theory]—and what distinguishes it from [other] economic theories—is its insistence that, so long as a government's debt is denominated in its own currency, there is no upper limit on the state's monetary borrowing.” He went on to say that under this theory “public debt is irrelevant”. He did not say that, but he referred to it as part of that theory. He further stated, “a country's central bank can always avoid default by printing more money.”
We know that there are real risks to this approach, and there are countless examples of debt monetization leading to out-of-control inflation. The Bank of Canada must adjust to the reality that this cannot go on forever. The Bank of Canada has been buying a minimum of $4 billion in government bonds every week, accumulating more than $250 billion of the securities over the past year. As reported, its share of the holdings of the outstanding bond market continues to grow, and it currently owns more than 35% of the total marketed outstanding Government of Canada debt. We should all be watching the Bank of Canada's actions and future decisions.
I do not say these things to cause alarm, but rather as someone who witnessed the crushing interest rate hikes and inflation in previous decades. I fully understand the necessity to help get our economy back on track and those suffering. However, we must quickly turn our attention to getting our finances under control. As parliamentary committees gear up to study the various parts of this omnibus bill, Canadians are counting on all of us to get this right, so we must ensure that every dollar being spent will, in fact, grow our economy and improve the lives of those we represent.
View Pierre Poilievre Profile
CPC (ON)
View Pierre Poilievre Profile
2021-05-11 17:23 [p.7084]
Mr. Speaker, do you remember grade school history class, when a student would raise her hand and ask why the king did not just create more money if there was not enough? He was the king, after all. Almost all children ask that question at school at some point when they are learning history. Then the teacher has to explain that, if the king creates more money, inflation goes up.
Young students are not the only ones asking that question and thinking about the concept of creating more money to cover government spending. Academics, U.S. members of Congress and even former U.S. presidential candidate Bernie Sanders have endorsed a concept called “modern monetary theory”, which states that a government can spend as much as it wants and the central bank can just print more money. If inflation goes up, as the grade school teacher tells the students, all the government has to do to reduce inflation is raise taxes. Ultimately, the people are the ones who have to pay, but in the beginning, everyone thinks it is all free.
This theory is becoming more popular. The current federal government says it is against the theory, but is that really the case? Let us look at the numbers. Last year, the government ran up a $350-billion deficit, of which the Bank of Canada bought $300 billion, or over 75%. The fact is, the Bank of Canada now owns almost one-third of the federal government's debt. The debt that is now in the hands of the Bank of Canada has increased by hundreds of percentage points.
This year, the government announced that it would borrow $3 billion per week. How much will the Bank of Canada provide to the government each week? Also $3 billion. For every dollar the government borrows each week, the Bank of Canada will provide the same amount. This has never happened in the history of the country. Even during wartime, when money was needed to finance armies, money was loaned by citizens. They bought interest-bearing bonds, allowing them to save money while financing the war against the enemy. Now, however, the government has decided to print money.
Is this really a modern concept? If my colleagues think that a concept used over 2,000 years ago is modern, then I guess we can call it modern. Let us recall the dictator Dionysius of Syracuse, who never had enough money because he was always fighting wars and living lavishly. Unable to pay his bills, he collected all the coins on his island, each of which was worth one drachma, the currency of the Greeks at that time. He then stamped each one-drachma coin with the number two. Now he had twice as much money to spend.
It was like magic, except now the public had to pay twice as much for all the goods and services on the island because the money was worth half as much as it was before. The ultrarich, the dictator's entourage, the bankers, the big businessmen and the military leaders were much richer, but the workers had to pay more just to put food on the table and survive.
That is not the only example. In Europe, throughout the great Napoleonic Wars, kings and leaders tried to mint more coins with less silver to fund their wars. During the wars, people noticed that there was less silver in the coins and that the cost of living was going up for ordinary citizens.
In Germany, during the First World War, the government inflated the value of its currency tenfold. After the war, the Germans had to cart around a huge amount of money just to buy a loaf of bread. At the restaurant, they would order 10 or 15 beers at once as soon as they arrived because the price could shoot up hour by hour over the course of the evening. They were better off ordering as soon as they got to the restaurant.
The economist Milton Friedman, who won the Nobel Prize in economics for his work on inflation and the creation of money, demonstrated that in the United States, the United Kingdom, Japan, Germany and Brazil, there was a perfect correlation between an increase in the production of money and an increase in prices.
That is the history of the creation of money. When there is too much money chasing too few goods and services, prices go up. Have prices gone up in Canada since the government began paying its bills with printed money?
A Financial Post article states that the central banks and government are out of touch with Main Street when it comes to the rising cost of living. According to the latest Canada's Food Price Report, every year, the cost of meat increases by 5% to 7%, the cost of bread increases by 4% to 6%, and the cost of vegetables increases by 5% to 7%, and gas prices have increased by 78% to $1.18. Yes, prices are going up.
Home prices have also gone up by one-third, or 30%. Young Canadians cannot even dream of owning a house because of the skyrocketing prices. That is good for the wealthy. The ultrawealthy are seeing their assets increase in value, but the working class, the people doing the work, are seeing their wages decrease in real terms. A lot of money is being transferred from workers to the ultrawealthy.
Elected officials never voted for this inflation tax. This tax is worse than all other taxes because it targets the poor, who do not have assets and cannot increase their net worth.
We must control the spending and stop the central banks from printing money so that we can protect the value of our dollar and the value of workers' time. This will give us an economy that compensates people based on merit, on their contributions, not based on the inflation of their assets and cost of living.
View Pierre Poilievre Profile
CPC (ON)
View Pierre Poilievre Profile
2021-05-11 17:35 [p.7085]
Madam Speaker, I rise today to point out that this extremely costly 700-page half-trillion-dollar budget will raise the cost of living for working class people. When money is printed to pay bills, the cost of living is driven up, increasing inflation, which drives up interest rates. Those higher interest rates that will apply to record levels of household corporate and governmental debt will lead to an inevitable debt crisis.
The government is not giving anything. It actually is taking away and it is doing so through the most surreptitious and insidious method, which is an inflation tax brought on by heavy doses of printing money, which is going to hurt the working class while helping the super-rich and causing a debt crisis. We should not be going in that the direction.
View Tamara Jansen Profile
CPC (BC)
Mr. Speaker, “Annual income twenty pounds, annual expenditure nineteen nineteen and six, result happiness. Annual income twenty pounds, annual expenditure twenty pounds ought and six, result misery.” That is a quote from the great Charles Dickens in his novel David Copperfield. It was published way back in 1850, but is just as prescient as ever 171 years later. It is this basic principle of the need to live within one's means that has stood the test of time, keeping people and countries out of the poorhouse century after century. However, with the pandemic, we have seen common sense flung out the window, baby, bathwater and all.
Under the guise of the unprecedented nature of COVID-19, we have seen the government wield the heavy hand of opportunistic change in this budget, adding 16 billion dollars' worth of new permanent spending while Canadians are too busy trying to keep food on their tables and clothes on their backs to fight back. In a finance committee dissenting report, the Conservative members stated:
Now is no time for risky experiments or fantastical utopias. Instead, we must do what has always worked: free enterprise. Only voluntary exchange of work for wages, investment for interest and product for payment allows free people “to do well by doing good”....
Unfortunately, the Minister of Finance has ignored the true value and dignity that work affords a person, and has thrown the dice on a plan to print as much money as she wants to spend, hoping that her assumptions of low interest rates and low inflation last forever. What about the assumption that interest rates will remain low for the long term? Has the finance minister run some what-if scenarios with her team to see how much could change if any one of her hunches fail? The Parliamentary Budget Officer has intimated that there is no wiggle room in the current budget for inflation or interest rates to rise without serious consequences. It looks like we got a budget full of unicorn dreams that is long on hope and short on reality.
What is the reality we are currently living in? I can say with full confidence that inflation has reared its ugly head at every hardware and grocery store across the country, hitting those who can least afford it the hardest. Not only has damage to the global supply chain kicked low inflation in the teeth, but Canadians find themselves short on cash for necessities every month. In the latest consumer debt index survey from MNP LTD, just over half of Canadians surveyed said they are, at most, $200 per month away from being unable to pay all of their monthly bills and debt obligations. That is an incredibly scary statistic when we know that the cost of meat and dairy is rising, along with that of gas and rent, at a very steady pace.
With the continued implementation of quantitative easing, the Bank of Canada, in concert with the government, has decided to print money as fast as the government spends it. It has been proven by our own finance department that we do not need the huge sums of dollars the Bank of Canada is pumping off its printing presses. Our economy has been functioning well, with mortgage business increasing by 20% over the previous year. No one has been hoarding their dollars, which can be seen by the 20% increase in cash available on the market. The suggestion that these measures were necessary because of the risk of deflation has also been proven to be completely false.
As the government continues to spend, supported by the complicit printing presses at the Bank of Canada, our dollar is being seriously devalued, and the hardest hit are those who can least afford it. For those who rent, the rent is going up. For those going to the grocery store, the grocery bill is going up. For those getting gas at the gas pump, the gas bill is going up.
At the finance committee, the Governor of the Bank of Canada was adamant that he is completely independent from the government and the finance minister's policy decisions. However, let us take a deeper dive into what that independence actually looks like.
Last year our deficit was $352 billion, and last year the Bank of Canada bought $302 billion of that debt. This year our deficit will be $154 billion, and lo and behold, the Bank of Canada will buy $156 billion of that debt. Is it a mere coincidence that these numbers look so eerily similar, or can we all just admit that the governor has no choice but to respond to the policy decisions of the finance minister?
At committee, the Conservatives put forward the following recommendation: “Restore the independence of the Bank of Canada to ensure it focuses solely on its mandate of targeting inflation to 2 per cent a year.” It is very deep within the report, but it is there, because we believe this is imperative for a strong economy.
As we see, inflation has risen above the 2% target, and the lockstep of government deficits and Bank of Canada debt purchases continues. It is clear that independence is not functioning as it should.
The business of creating dollars out of thin air that has been happening in our country simply debases the money that already exists. That is the money people have in their savings accounts. It is the money they got in last month's paycheques. It is the money they have been saving for down payments on their first homes. It now buys less than it did a year ago. The monetary policy this government is utilizing to cover its unhinged spending is costing Canadians big time. It is nothing but a tax by another name, and the poor middle class end up bearing the brunt of it.
The Liberal budget has been widely criticized by many economists for being more concerned with redistribution than with economic growth. The focus is not so much on earning the money, but on borrowing it, so much so that we will borrow more in the next six years than in the last 152 combined.
No new taxes were another recommendation that the Conservatives included in our dissenting report. The Financial Post recently reported that our finance minister has indicated her support for joining President Biden's plan for a global minimum corporate tax, urging all countries to do the same. As a matter of fact, she called the idea “a breakthrough moment”. She made it clear that global interests are a priority over the best economic and financial interests of Canada, our workers and our young people, who will inherit our debt and our social programs.
What about $10-a-day day care? It is the centrepiece of this budget. The path to getting every Canadian back to work, we hear, is making sure every woman can put her children in a government-run institution for a mere 10 bucks a day. The finance minister would have us believe that all the mothers out there have been dying for this one-size-fits-all solution.
As a matter of fact, what I hear from constituents is that they want choice. Some prefer to leave their preschool children with close family, perhaps with grandparents where they are able to share their cultural and moral values. Others might want to share child care responsibilities with their neighbours, giving them flexibility around their very complex schedules. A one-size-fits-all program just does not fit the needs of Canadian parents for flexibility and alternatives. Does this government really think that it knows better than a mother what sort of care would be in her child's interests?
Add to that the challenge of getting the provinces on board. The finance minister has made this promise with some big strings attached. Since she will only foot 50% of the bill, the provinces will have to cough up the rest. Right now they cannot afford it, according to our Parliamentary Budget Officer. From where I stand, it looks like a very empty promise meant only as part of an upcoming election platform. The Liberals have been pledging this for years, and reneging on it just as often.
When Liberals stand up in the House and talk about their record, I would urge Canadians to stop and think about how much their grocery bills have risen since the Liberals came to power, about how much it costs to fill their gas tanks at the pumps or how far away their dreams of owning their own homes have become. Under the Liberals' watch, everything has gone up in price.
As Conservatives, we know that there is nothing better for our country than having its young people aspire to new heights, develop new ideas, and work with their hands and their hearts to create new wealth and prosperity free from government overreach. It is our commitment to all Canadians to create opportunities for them to be the solution and the economic drivers of our recovery. It is Canadians' hard work and ingenuity that makes this country great, not the Liberal government. I am thankful for all that Canadians do for their communities.
View Dave Epp Profile
CPC (ON)
View Dave Epp Profile
2021-05-06 13:33 [p.6788]
Madam Speaker, I appreciate the opportunity to put some thoughts on the record with respect to Bill C-30. I want to thank my colleague from Foothills for splitting his time with me.
In my riding of Chatham-Kent—Leamington, or CKL for short, agriculture, agri-food and agri-food processing is a bedrock element of our local economy, just like for the previous speaker.
I want to begin my comments here. Before proceeding, I would also note that as a father of four daughters, my desire is that they face no glass ceilings in their careers. I want to congratulate the finance minister on being the first female finance minister to deliver a budget. My youngest daughter Kiana just completed her masters in economics, and so maybe, one day, she, too, will deliver a budget, hopefully one based on solid economics rather than election politics.
Back to agriculture, the Canadian agriculture and agri-food system is a key driver of our economy and generates $143 billion, accounts for 7.4% of our GDP, and provides for one in eight jobs, at least in 2018, and more than that this year.
This budget does include some provisions for up $100 million for rebates from the carbon tax for on-farm natural gas and propane use. At the agriculture and agri-food committee, we are presently finishing a review of Bill C-206, sponsored by my colleague, the MP for Northumberland—Peterborough South, which proposes an exemption from the carbon tax for on-farm propane and natural gas.
No doubt the existence of this private member's bill influenced the government's decision to include this measure. We discussed, and continue to discuss, at committee the utility of a rebate versus an exemption system. Farmers in my riding and indeed farmers all across Canada can thank Conservatives for this initiative appearing in the budget. Nevertheless, it is good to see that this issue is acknowledged, and that is a positive.
I also want to acknowledge monies targeted to agriculture in the form of incentives as part of programming to address climate initiatives. Practically speaking, though, the costs alone of fossil fuels, of nitrogen fertilizers is enough to encourage their judicious use. Despite that, innovation and environmental responsibility have always been hallmarks of our ag sector.
As the Minister of Agriculture and Agri-Food has acknowledged, present viable, scalable technologies that reduce agriculture's greenhouse gas emissions are presently lacking. Given that, incentives to encourage development and innovation are far better tools than punitive taxes, as many witnesses at the committee have testified.
However, if there is one measure that has the potential to move the needle in the adoption of technology in the ag sector, it is the expansion of high-speed broadband to rural and remote areas. The further adoption of precision agriculture, a key technology to build on ag's strong track record of environmental responsibility, is so often hindered by the lack of high-speed Internet access, and the previous speaker echoed these comments.
While the $1 billion amount announced for the universal broadband fund pales in comparison to other funding promises, it is the increased use of this technology that does have the potential to lower ag greenhouse gas emissions.
Given all the attention that the deficit of connectivity in rural and remote areas has attracted over the years, all of the promises, all of the election pledges, even before COVID-19, should have led to the ag sector, and indeed all rural Canadians, using world-class broadband infrastructure by now.
To quote a recent Western Producer editorial, “They didn't and we don't.” The parallels between promises of increased high-speed access and national child care programs are eerily similar, often announced and seldom delivered.
Specifically, I want to point out the situation in my riding of Pelee Island. While the most southerly inhabited point in Canada, it can be considered as remote as, if not more remote than, many parts of our north. There is no reliable 911 service. As it currently stands, Pelee Island has no broadband Internet available to the public. Internet speed on the island is either dial-up or slow cellular hubs for existing businesses, residents and visitors with huge costs associated for small amounts of data. Stormy weather disrupts this service. Pelee Island is the very definition of remote, with only boat and air access in summer, in good weather, and only air access in winter, again, in good weather.
My riding lies in southwestern Ontario, a region serviced by the Southwestern Integrated Fibre Technology, or SWIFT for short. Ten per cent of Canada's underserved broadband area resides in southwestern Ontario.
Therefore, under the government's previous connect to innovate, CTI, program, SWIFT's share of funding should have amounted to $58.5 million, yet the amount received was zero, not a penny. Similar to the structure of the previous CTI program, the government has chosen to administer the present universal broadband fund with no pro rata share provisions for under-serviced areas. This budget contains spending measures of $509 billion, over half a trillion dollars, but Canadians were looking for a budget with a plan for growth, for investment in infrastructure and a budget with a debt management plan to recover from the huge impacts of COVID.
I recently surveyed my constituents on a host of issues. Specifically on the statement that small businesses are the key to economic rebound in Canada, and 87% of respondents agreed or strongly agreed. Only 13% agreed or strongly agreed that multinational corporations were the key to our economic recovery. My constituents and all Canadians were looking not for a government-led spending plan, but a budget investing in infrastructure and creating the climate for a business-led recovery. The small businesses that I relate to in Chatham and Leamington, Blenheim, Ridgetown and many other towns in Chatham-Kent—Leamington need the confidence that their government will manage the country's finances well, so that the climate into which they invest is stable and predictable.
While this budget talks about some small investments in infrastructure and necessary measures to support small businesses affected by government, what this budget does not contain is a plan to pay for all of the election promises. There are no tax reforms, no financial guardrails anchored to fixed thresholds, no targets and no path to balance. These are the kinds of measures that give small business the confidence to invest and lead our recovery, and that is this budget's greatest failure.
Is this the spending legacy that we want to leave to our children and grandchildren? Last June I had the pleasure of announcing in the House the birth of my first grandchild. I also stated at the time that it was estimated that her share of the federal interest-bearing debt would be over $39,300 at fiscal year end. I was wrong. According to the budget just tabled, her share of the debt as of March 31 is over $43,300 and the budget predicts that her share of the debt five years from now will grow to over $50,700.
Here is what really scares me. Today's budget has assumed an average interest rate-carrying cost on our present debt of 1.2%. Yes, today's interest rates are low, but these budget assumptions assume that the average carrying cost will only rise to 1.9% five years from now. This assumption is inconsistent with how the government is funding its annual deficits. The government is printing money to finance its spending and every time in the past when governments have done this, the economy experiences inflation. In fact, we already are.
Asset inflation is here, as anyone who is trying to buy a house or a two-by-four already knows, and the Consumer Price Index is sure to follow. What follows inflation? It is higher interest rates as the government tries to rein in inflation and prop up its currency, so I have very little faith that interest rates will average 1.9% on the government debt five years from now.
Who does this hurt? People who have assets with low debt like this scenario, but for those working for a paycheque, their wages seldom keep up to rising costs. Everyday Canadians do not want this inflationary future, so this budget, with so much unfocused inflationary spending, cannot be supported. We will hear the usual refrains from government members that we Conservatives want to have our cake and eat it, too. Conservatives have supported and will continue to support measures to support Canadians and small business, but not the reckless, uncontrolled spending without a plan for our grandchildren.
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