Greg McLean

Mr. Speaker, Procedure · 21 wordsfirst of all, I would like to say that I will be sharing my time with my colleague from New Tecumseth—Gwillimbury.Procedure Positioning · 52 wordsThis has been quite the spring economic statement or spring economic update, whatever the government wants to call it. A lot goes into every financial statement the government puts forward. It seems that there is no shortage of money to keep pouring out, but there is a real lack of fiscal discipline.Positioning Claims · 28 wordsOne thing I did notice about this government over the last six and a half years that I have been here is its ability to announce and announce, Positioning · 34 wordsas if it is going to continue to do great things. Announcing things, spending money and accomplishing very little seems to be the flavour of the day and that happens all the time here.Positioning Procedure · 21 wordsI want to go through a bunch of things in my speech here. I do not mean to just be critical, ProcedurePromise · 19 wordsso I will also be giving some good feedback on some of the things that work in this budget.Partly on point Claims · 30 wordsFirst of all, let us talk about what my colleague across the way talked about, all the announcements of the 20 economic and defence partnerships signed in the last year.¹ Reasoning · 3 wordsPartnerships are signatures. Positioning · 17 wordsI would like to see what really comes out of those at the end of the day.Positioning The ask · 6 wordsWe need to measure these outcomes. Reasoning · 7 wordsThese are not just papers we sign. Claims · 37 wordsWe are not a republic. Our Prime Minister is not a president who gets to write executive orders and say, “This is the way things are.” We are diminishing the role of the House of Commons here. The ask · 30 wordsWe need to get back to actually doing things in the House of Commons that are good for all Canadians and include the input of people from across this country.Off point Procedure · 12 wordsI went through the budget. The budget talked about a few things, ProcedurePositioning · 14 wordsand I know that the government likes the high-level stuff to start the budget.Positioning Claims · 9 wordsIt talks about the rule of law in Canada. Reasoning · 19 wordsIf we had the rule of law in Canada, we would have a very stable investment dynamic right now, Claims · 43 wordswhich we are clearly missing. This stable, reliable financial system is one that is layered more and more on top of an oligopoly that really benefits from the weight that it maintains and that, of course, the government would like that to be. The ask · 57 wordsWe need to make sure we have a more diverse economy, a more open economy, an economy where people can see what the rules are and invest accordingly, not just invest when the government says, “Hey, we have some friends here, let us give them some money so they will put some more money into the economy.” Reasoning · 13 wordsThat is not the way a modern, democratic country is supposed to run. Claims · 6 wordsIt also talked about investment attractiveness. Procedure · 11 wordsLet me tell the House what investment attractiveness would actually mean.Procedure Reasoning · 21 wordsIt would mean that the pension funds that collect money from Canadians in Canada would actually reinvest that money into Canada. Claims · 78 wordsMost of those pension funds invest most of their money offshore and for good reason, because this government has created an economic and investment climate in this country that does not work if we want a return on capital. That return on capital, of course, is competitive with jurisdictions around the world, even to the south of us, where we have a trade partner that is not behaving as if we actually had a trade agreement with them. The ask · 12 wordsWe have to make sure that we actually stand up against that. Claims · 75 wordsThe next thing the budget talked about was tax competitiveness, but it was talked about under new business investment. All the current business investment is not taxed efficiently here in Canada. However, the government will give all kinds of tax credits if some new capital is brought into Canada. There is no clear path to what that represents as far as the rule of law going forward is concerned. Then it talked about Canadian resources, Positioning · 13 wordswhich we are proud to stand for on this side of the House.Positioning Claims · 52 wordsI am sure the members know the numerous entreaties we have made to the Liberal government to make sure we actually have a better resource industry in this country, with more transparency and more ability to get some things done, because the budget did talk about transparency. However, there is no transparency. Positioning · 16 wordsThere is a complete black hole. What are the rules today? What are the rules tomorrow?Positioning Claims · 21 wordsContinually changing the rules on our resource industry is what holds back investment in our most important part of our economy. Reasoning · 54 wordsI say most important not because I am trying to diminish any of the other parts of the Canadian economy, but because I want to make sure people understand how much those resource industries contribute to Canada, in employment, in taxation and in the balance of payments with our trade partners around the world. Claims · 13 wordsIt is lopsided how much we actually benefit from the resources we export. The ask · 48 wordsWe have to make sure that we have a level playing field that says, “Invest here, in this country, in these resources and you will get a return and there will be a line of sight on how that actually turns out for your shareholders and your company.” Procedure · 17 wordsNow I am going to differ with a few things the government said in this economic statement.Procedure Claims · 11 wordsIt talked about having the second-fastest growing economy in the G7. Positioning · 3 wordsThat is great, PositioningClaims · 54 wordsbut most of those are in Europe. Japan’s in a bit of a mix right now. Compared to our neighbour to the south, we are forecast to be growing at 1.5%, ²and they are at 2.3%. The growth rate in the United States is one and a half times higher than our growth rate. Positioning · 12 wordsWe are not doing that well considering who our nearest neighbour is.Positioning Procedure · 13 wordsWe have to take a step back to understand what is happening here.Procedure Claims · 30 wordsPart of what is happening, of course, is the lack of transparency with respect to what happens to the investments people make in Canada. The government talked about fiscal discipline. Procedure · 7 wordsLet me contradict it very clearly here: ProcedurePositioning · 12 wordsThere is no fiscal discipline on that side of the House whatsoever.Positioning Claims · 43 wordsThe Liberals talk about changing from a $78-billion deficit in the fall budget to a $67-billion deficit looking forward in the spring economic statement because of $7.8 billion more in collections from the resource industry.³ This is how we are making our money. Positioning · 7 wordsThis is how we are getting better.Positioning Claims · 46 wordsHowever, no sooner do they see a whole bunch of new revenue coming in from taxation than they decide to spend that in a bunch of other maladjusted ways as far as investing and throwing more money out the door. They can call it an investment, Positioning · 16 wordsbut it is a really bad use of our money. This is not a bottomless pit.Positioning The ask · 16 wordsCanadians need to make sure that we get back to balance at some point in time. Reasoning · 17 wordsThat balance means at least a zero deficit, and hopefully a surplus at some point in time, Claims · 41 wordsbecause we have gotten massively into debt in this country. The government got cute in the spring economic statement and changed its actual fiscal anchor from a net debt to GDP and a declining deficit to a net deficit to GDP.⁴ Reasoning · 9 wordsThat is because the GDP is not increasing enough. Claims · 29 wordsMembers would know that when we talk about GDP, we are talking about consumption plus investment, plus government expenditures, plus exports, minus imports, one of which is government expenditures. Reasoning · 10 wordsGovernment expenditures keep increasing and therefore keep increasing the GDP. Claims · 17 wordsThe rest of the equation is not holding weight because it is not that investable an economy. The ask · 9 wordsWe need to do much better in that respect. Claims · 16 wordsA $67‑billion deficit is one thing, but $1.4 trillion in debt is the government’s book number.⁵ Procedure · 6 wordsLet me explain what that means.Procedure Claims · 147 wordsThe government has borrowed almost $2 trillion.⁶ It is paying interest on almost $2 trillion through its various agencies. The difference between $2 trillion and $1.4 trillion is $600 billion, which is in the various accounts at Crown corporations and other borrowing entities, many of which have opaque accounting mechanisms where they are not writing off their debts. Therefore, when the new government comes in, we are going to have to see a massive writeoff of all the debts that the current government has accumulated and has not put on its books at this point in time. That includes things like, of course, the Canada Infrastructure Bank. We pointed out at committee that it had $600 million‑plus in loans to Lion Electric in the first place.⁷ We have all kinds of boondoggles like that sitting in several Crown corporations that are part of the government’s debt profile. The ask · 15 wordsThey have to be more transparent. This is something that has to change going forward. Claims · 12 wordsOn March 27, the Liberals increased the borrowing authority to $2.54 trillion.⁸ Positioning · 9 wordsThat tells Canadians where they are going with this.Positioning Claims · 14 wordsWe are going to have an extra half trillion dollars in debt going forward. Aside · 1 wordsCongratulations.Aside Positioning · 6 wordsThere is no stopping this train.Positioning Thanks · 73 wordsI need to give the government credit for what it has done with respect to training and for allocating a whole bunch of money to the trades. I am very thankful for that. I would like to thank the government because that is another page from the Conservative book that it took out of our policy manual, having more money put into the trades in this country so that we have better outcomes.Thanks The ask · 25 wordsFor that whole layer of jobs that is unfulfilled at this point in time, we need to make sure we get those technical people trained. Thanks · 9 wordsI thank the government for putting that in there.Thanks The ask · 23 wordsSomething else I think the Liberals could put on there, if they are thinking about taking something else from our books, is defence. Claims · 14 wordsI know they have increased the money for defence.⁹ They have increased the salaries. Thanks · 3 wordsGood for them.Thanks Claims · 23 wordsNow they are going for another defence procurement agency, a defence bank, and all these things where they are spending money on bureaucrats. The ask · 22 wordsHere is what the Liberals need to do. They need to spend money on defence and spend money on actually getting things. Claims · 18 wordsThe United States has rightly been complaining about how much we have not spent on defence in Canada. The ask · 8 wordsThey should take another page from our book. Claims · 38 wordsIn the last election, we talked about getting Iqaluit built as a base.¹⁰ That should be a 90‑day process: Here is the money we need to spend on this and here is where we have to get going. The ask · 15 wordsThey should act as if there is some urgency here and get some things going. Positioning · 10 wordsWe do not mind sharing these ideas with the government.Positioning The ask · 34 wordsWe need to make some things happen in this country as quickly as possible. I beseech the government to take the good ideas we have presented to it and make them work going forward. Procedure · 35 wordsThere are a whole bunch of other issues here. I would love to keep talking, because there are other things I have to talk about, but I know my time has come to an end.Procedure