Blake Richards

“Madam Speaker, it is certainly my pleasure to get up today and put a few words on the record about the disastrous situation in which we find ourselves with the government moving time allocation on Bill C-31. Some of my colleagues today have covered the challenges pretty well. This is a habit we see from the Liberal government relatively frequently. We have members opposite making comments that this is a new Liberal government. Of course, it is not. The vast majority of members of the government benches on that side are certainly people who have been in cabinet and parliamentary secretary roles for a very long time, so the argument that this is a new government in any way, shape or form is a bit fictitious. Nonetheless, the government continues to perpetuate this myth to the Canadian public, which we find very unfortunate. Similarly unfortunate is the Liberals’ inability to control their own spending. The Liberals go on and on about how they are going to create more jobs and how everybody in Canada is going to do better with just one more deficit. One more is going to do it. “I promise,” say the Liberals, that one more deficit will be the one that is going to get Canadians ahead this time and we are going to make it. We have yet to see that reap any real benefits for Canadians after 11 long, tired years of this failed economic strategy. In fact, more Canadians now are lined up at food banks than at any point in recorded history. That is a shockingly bad statistic and one that these members fail to take accountability for. It is a bit alarming that they seem to think that the few programs they have put forward, some of which are tweaked with this budget implementation act, are going to make any substantial dent in those enormously long lines at every single food bank across the country, many of which are actually running out of food. We are a bit shocked that the Liberals cannot eat a little slice of humble pie. They cannot find that at a food bank because they are out of food, but if they could make one for themselves and take a little bite, it might be good for the Canadian public to see that for the first time from the tired 11-year-old Liberal government. They might actually come to appreciate the efforts they are undertaking maybe slightly more, because right now they seem to hear from the government that life has never been better. I do not know any constituents in Brandon—Souris who believe that is true. On top of that, then the Liberals go and blow another $60-billion deficit, or whatever they managed to pitch that down to with the spring economic update. It is shockingly high for a government that committed in the last election to spend less to invest more. What happened to that? I have no idea where that slogan went to die, somewhere in the Liberal backbench. Perhaps the member for Laurier—Sainte-Marie took that with him when he walked out with the environmental caucus. I am not sure where that is going, but nonetheless, we are concerned about the spending the government continues to perpetuate. If that was not bad enough, now we have government members who do not even want to debate their spending or answer questions regarding their spending. The Prime Minister failed to stand up and answer any questions in question period today. It is fair game to question why exactly that is. He also failed to take any questions from the media all weekend long, including today, and particularly on Friday, when it was announced that this country has in fact dived into what is unquestionably meeting the definition of a recession. The parliamentary secretary to the finance minister often stands up and loudly proclaims the Prime Minister’s economic credentials. If he is such an expert, why does he not want to answer questions about the economy? He does not want to answer them from us. If he does not respect Parliament and does not want to answer questions in question period more than once a week because it is too much of a bother for him, okay, but he should answer questions from the media then. The Liberals always profess to have a greater respect for the national press gallery than Conservatives, they claim, and yet it is our leader time and time again taking questions from the media. I was with him today when he offered a press conference, offering not just critiques of the government, but also our party’s proposed path forward to deliver a better economic path for this country that might get us back out of this recession. There was nothing from the Prime Minister, nothing at all. What a shame. There was nothing from the finance minister either. Where is the finance minister? Why is he not answering these questions for the media, if not for the House of Commons? I would add that I am splitting my time with the esteemed member for Airdrie—Cochrane. An hon. member: Oh, oh! Grant Jackson: Madam Speaker, the member for Winnipeg North knows better than that. I know that he does not like what I have to say, because he is a member of that tired, exhausted, spent Liberal team that has been in the front couple of benches for the last 11 years. The Liberals have no new ideas. They have no vision on how to spend smarter to actually get this country into a proper economic footprint. We are the only country in the G7 that has slipped into a recession. That is not a proud legacy for the member for Winnipeg North, and I feel bad for him, except for the fact that he cannot admit it. None of them can over there. They cannot admit their mistake, and that is unfortunate for Winnipeggers, unfortunate for Manitobans and definitely unfortunate for the country of Canada. Perhaps it is time for some fresh blood from Winnipeg. We have the member for Elmwood Transcona, who is fresh blood as a Winnipegger in the House. What an excellent member of Parliament he is, and I cannot wait to see all the contributions he is going to make to this Parliament over the course of its duration. However, to get back on track here, we are talking about finances, and it is terribly concerning what that member and the entire Liberal cabinet have done to the finances of this country over the course of the last long 11 years. The Liberals said that budgets balance themselves. Do members remember that one? That was a good one. What happened to the minister of middle-class prosperity? I loved that one, before I got elected to this place. There is still no definition from Liberal members as to what the heck that means. There is no concept. What has happened to the middle class since they appointed that ministry? Well, the ministry got abolished pretty shortly thereafter, because it was such a tire fire. Unfortunately, now all the middle class is at the food banks, and they ran out of food. That pretty much sums up the Liberal record on middle-class prosperity. It has been an abject failure, and now they do not want to even take questions on it. The Liberals have moved time allocation on this bill so that they have only three hours of debate on a bill that, as my colleagues have mentioned, is over 300 pages long. They are going to ram through votes so that they can go off for the summer and spend like Liberals often do. I guess we will see. Maybe the eleventh time is the charm. I doubt it. I really doubt it, but perhaps this time the significant deficit put forward by the government, the minister and that failed front bench will have better luck than “budgets balance themselves”, better luck than “spend less to invest more” and better luck, hopefully, I am praying, than the former minister of middle-class prosperity.”