“We should be debating the government's budget and the debt it puts on Canadians, not election results. My job as an opposition member is to hold the government accountable and fight for Canadians.”

“Mr. Speaker, I want to thank the hon. member for acknowledging that I am brilliant in this debate. I appreciate him making that comment. The member refers to three by-elections in the country and is trying to correlate it somehow to what is happening in this debate here. We are debating the budget of the government and the indebtedness it is putting on Canadians. He wants to talk about politics and percentages in elections. I can say that if they keep this up, we will see what happens in the next election. We are here and not going anywhere. We are going to keep fighting for Canadians. Our job as members of the official opposition in this country is to hold the government to account. It is getting no free lunch. Canadians deserve better than what they are getting.”

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“The government wants to borrow $25 billion to create an investment fund. Canada has debt, not extra wealth to invest. This plan will cost taxpayers money while helping wealthy insiders. The government should cut taxes and remove rules on energy projects instead.”

“Mr. Speaker, this week, Canadians got a fiscal update on the state of the Liberal-managed decline wrapped up in a Liberal rebranding exercise. The Liberal Prime Minister stood and announced what he calls a Canada Strong fund. It is a so-called sovereign wealth fund. Let us be precise, because words actually matter in the chamber. A sovereign wealth fund requires one thing above all else: wealth. After 11 years of Liberal mismanagement, spiralling deficits, out-of-control inflation, skyrocketing unemployment and leaving our resources in the ground, Canada does not have sovereign wealth. What we have a lot of is sovereign debt. Real sovereign wealth funds, whether they are in Norway, Singapore or elsewhere, are built on persistent budget surpluses. They are built on discipline. They are built on governments that live within their means and invest excess national prosperity for future generations. This is a simple concept that the Liberals seem to have never understood. What did Canadians hear this week? They heard about a Liberal government that is running the largest deficit outside of the pandemic. It is a deficit double the size of the one was left behind by the last Liberal prime minister. They heard about a Liberal Prime Minister whose policies have driven $1.3 trillion in federal debt. They heard about a Liberal government whose direct program spending is up 12.5%, even as Canadians struggle to pay for groceries and rent. On top of all of that, they are now being told that another $25 billion will be borrowed on the backs of taxpayers. The national credit card will fund this new Liberal scheme. This is no sovereign wealth fund. This is a sovereign debt fund. Let us call this so-called Canada Strong fund what it is: a Liberal slush fund dressed up as a sovereign debt fund. The Liberal government will borrow money, the interest payments for which will be serviced on the backs of Canadian taxpayers and future generations, at a time when Canadians are already drowning in debt. The Liberal government will then place all of that borrowed money into a politically managed investment vehicle. It will take risks with it and hope that the returns will exceed the cost of borrowing. If they do not, Canadians will lose. If they do, Liberal insiders will enjoy the profit leveraged on the backs of Canadians. This is not to mention that real sovereign wealth funds have investment mandates that enable them to invest globally. They are not contrived, investing in a few hand-picked domestic projects tied to Liberal insiders. That is not the sound fiscal policy the Liberal Prime Minister likes to tout. That is a gamble with other people’s money. It is Canadians’ money. Speaking of Liberal insiders, let us talk about who stands to benefit, because this idea of a Liberal sovereign slush fund did not emerge in a vacuum. Back in 2024, this very concept of a multi-billion-dollar investment fund was pitched by none other than the one and only Brookfield Asset Management. Let us not forget that the Liberal Prime Minister was the chair of Brookfield for all of 2024. The insider proposal was simple. Create a large public investment vehicle and have Brookfield help manage it by sticking its fingers into it, hand-picking investments in insider-owned projects that would get preferential regulatory treatment and gain access to fast-tracked approvals over its competitors. It would then double-dip. Brookfield would propose to co-invest alongside the so-called sovereign wealth fund and participate in any upside value. On top of that, it would be triple-dipping, because Brookfield would profit again through charging hefty investment management fees, regardless of the performance of the fund. In other words, Brookfield would take taxpayer dollars, funnel them into a politically corporate insider slush fund and allow private financial actors to participate, with the same corporate insiders managing the funds, charging a fee and then hand-picking insider projects that are politically charged. This means that the Liberal Prime Minister and his insider friends would be profiting off the scheme and siphoning funds in multiple ways, while Canadians absorb the downside risk. Fast-forward to this week. The Liberal Prime Minister, who has had extensive ties to Brookfield and has had stock options and equity interests connected to that firm, now unveils a fund using a strikingly similar model. Canadians are right to ask who this fund is really for. Is it for workers struggling to afford a home? Is it for families that are shouldering $3,400 a year in just federal debt interest payments? Is it for well-connected financial firms, corporate insiders and Liberal buddies of the Liberal Prime Minister who are looking to manage and siphon off billions in public capital? This is the same corruption we saw from the last Liberal prime minister, but with more steps and buried in more bureaucracy, agencies and complex corporate legal structures under a new Liberal brand. This raises serious questions about conflicts of interest. When the Liberal Prime Minister brings forward a policy that closely resembles a proposal that was advanced by a firm while he was its chair, which he has been financially tied to, Canadians deserve answers. They deserve transparency. They deserve to know whether decisions are being made in the public interest or in the interest of the Liberal Prime Minister and his corporate insiders. The pattern is very familiar. We have seen this movie before. We saw it when the last Liberal prime minister was in office. Let us not forget that the Liberals have already created the Canada Infrastructure Bank, the Canada growth fund and the defence bank. Each time, they promised to attract investment, productivity growth and wealth creation. Each time, they created new bureaucracies for highly paid consultants and bureaucrats and corporate positions for their Liberal friends, and all the while, they funnelled money into projects tied to Liberal insiders. Despite all of this, Canada still has the worst investment record in the G7. How many more funds will it take before the Liberals admit that the problem is not a lack of government vehicles? The problem is Liberal government policy and Liberal corruption. Let us take a step back. If a project has a real business case and it is viable, competitive and productive, it will naturally attract private capital and investors will fund it, not because the government says it will succeed but because the project will generate risk-adjusted returns that will exceed the cost of borrowing. That is how free markets work. That is how growth actually happens. However, if a project cannot attract private investment on its own merits, why should Canadian taxpayers be forced to take on that downside risk? Perhaps it is because the project’s beneficiaries would be Liberal friends and corporate insiders. Instead of spending taxpayer money, we could bring back $1 trillion in pension fund money that the Liberals have pushed out of Canada by fast-tracking permits, lowering taxes and unleashing free enterprise. Why should a single mother or a small business owner in Richmond Hill South be on the hook for speculative investments that are politically decided by these Liberals and that benefit only corporate insiders? They should not. Let us take a step back and look at the broader economic picture under the Liberal Prime Minister. Today, after his one year in office, Canada has the highest household debt in the G7, the most unaffordable housing in the G7, the lowest investment per worker in the G7, the worst food price inflation in the G7, the second-lowest productivity in the G7 and the second-highest unemployment rate in the G7. The list goes on. I know the Liberals love slogans, but this is not a record of building Canada strong. It is a record of decline overseen by Liberal mismanagement. Now, after all of this, the Liberals are asking Canadians to trust them with another $25 billion for the sovereign debt slush fund for Liberal insiders, and Canadians are not buying it. This week’s fiscal update can only be described as a Liberal credit card budget update. It is a budget that would double the deficit left behind and mean more costs, more taxes, more debt and more inflation. Let us look at the details a little more. It has $37 billion in net new spending announced alone, $3 billion more for international climate finance slush funds, $11 million for another investor meeting photo op and $2.3 billion to subsidize foreign-made electric vehicles. The Liberal government’s own economic update got one thing right. It predicts that growth will fall and inflation will rise this year. Layered on top of all that, there is a newly minted sovereign wealth fund with no wealth. It is just a sovereign debt fund disguising a Liberal slush fund for corporate insiders. Canadians are not confused. They understand what is happening. They are being asked to pay more for less once again. The consequences are already being felt. Canadians are now paying $59 billion annually in debt interest, which is up 10% in just one year. That is more than we spend on health care transfers. That is more than we collect in the GST. It means that every Canadian family would now be on the hook for $3,400 in Liberal interest just to service the interest payments on all that Liberal debt. That money would not build anything the Liberal Prime Minister claims he wants to build. It would not make investments in anything this Liberal Prime Minister says he wants to invest in. It would the money of hard-working Canadians going to pay just interest to bankers and bondholders. This is why the so-called Canada Strong fund is not the solution. It is a symptom of a Liberal government that has run out of ideas and believes that if it simply creates another Liberal institution, another Liberal acronym or another complex corporate structure wrapped in another Liberal announcement, with taxpayer money managed by highly paid Liberal government insiders, growth will somehow follow. The problem is not the problem itself. The problem is that the Liberal government does not know how to diagnose the problem at all. Growth does not come from Liberal branding exercises or decisions that are dictated by the government in Ottawa. Growth comes from investor and consumer confidence. It comes from trade and regulatory uncertainty. It comes from having a competitive economy and efficient capital markets. The Liberal government has managed to undermine all of these conditions. If the Liberal Prime Minister truly wanted to make Canada strong and truly wanted to make Canada wealthy, he would not be creating a sovereign debt fund on the backs of hard-working Canadians. He would be removing the barriers that are holding this country back. He would repeal the anti-resource law, Bill C-69, repeal the tanker ban, scrap the industrial carbon tax, end capital gains taxes on reinvestment in Canada and approve a pipeline or two by this summer. That is how we will unlock investment and the power of free enterprise. That is how we will create jobs and drive prosperity. That is how we will generate real, sustainable wealth for the next generation. Canada does not need a sovereign debt fund disguising a Liberal slush fund for insiders. Canada needs a government that will get out of the way, unleash our economy and let Canadians build the wealth this country was always meant to have, from generation to generation.”

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“Other countries develop their natural resources and support their workers, but Canada has some of the worst debt, housing costs, food prices, and unemployment in the G7. The member should talk to real people to see how much they are struggling.”

“Mr. Speaker, other countries do not leave their resource wealth in the ground. They do not block their local domestic talent from being able to succeed. Other countries, like Norway, do not have the highest household debt in the G7, the most unaffordable housing in the G7, the lowest investment per worker in the G7, the worst food price inflation in the G7, the second-lowest productivity in the G7 or the second-highest unemployment in the G7. Maybe the member should put his economics 101 textbook down and read a jobs report for once. He should go and knock on some doors, talk to his constituents and see what Canadians are really facing on the ground.”

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“The government's proposed wealth fund is not like successful funds in other countries. It will only invest in projects that help Liberal insiders. It was pitched in 2024 by a financial firm the Prime Minister led that same year. It is corrupt.”

“Mr. Speaker, the premise of the member’s question is that the Liberal slush fund has nothing similar to any of the sovereign wealth funds that have been successfully created in the past by other countries. First of all, other sovereign wealth funds are allowed to invest globally in an investment opportunity set that would maximize risk-adjusted returns. This Liberal slush fund would be restricted to a few selected investment decisions that would benefit projects tied to Liberal insiders. Second, this Liberal slush fund was pitched by Brookfield, which is none other than the financial firm the Liberal Prime Minister was the chair of in 2024. Guess when it was pitched. It was pitched in 2024. There are many striking similarities between this so-called sovereign debt fund and the Liberal corruption we have seen in the past.”

“I want to congratulate my former staff member on her engagement. Also, Alberta built a $32-billion savings fund from its oil profits. What does the member think about that?”

“Mr. Speaker, as I rise here today, I would like to congratulate Maria Gainey, who used to work for me. She got engaged on the weekend to her fiancé Toby, so I would like to congratulate them. My question for my hon. colleague is around sovereign wealth funds. Alberta has a heritage fund. This is a thing that has been done already in Canada. This happened at a time when Alberta was making record profits through the oil patch. It has continued and grown to $32 billion today. I am wondering if he has any comments about that.”

“The government wants to create a new fund and more bureaucracy managed by its own friends. In the last year, it has already created 13 new bureaucracies. This plan will add more debt for taxpayers instead of bringing in real investment. A fund should be built on wealth, but the government only gives us debt.”

“Mr. Speaker, that is exactly where the Liberal government gets it wrong. It would start a new bureaucracy and a new fund to be staffed and overseen by Liberal insiders. The Liberal government, in the past year alone, has already formed 13 new bureaucracies, all of which are overseen or managed by Liberal insiders. The government says it would be professionally managed, but it would actually be professionally managed to fail and to benefit only corporate insiders. That is one of the biggest differences we see compared to other models that are succeeding. We could unleash our resources and attract investment. We do not need to draw on more government debt that is going to be paid off by taxpayers and the next generation. The sovereign wealth fund should be built on one thing: wealth. What we have a lot of, after 11 years of Liberal governments, is debt.”

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“That member is not telling the truth. There are four pipelines, and I will share their names soon.”

“That member is misleading the House, Mr. Speaker. There are four pipelines. I will come back with the names very shortly—”

“The previous Conservative government built four major pipelines. I worked to build the Energy East pipeline too, but the Liberal government stopped it with regulations. Canada would be much better off today if the government had not blocked our oil and gas pipelines.”

“Mr. Speaker, I think your ruling was wise. As you said, I did not use the term “intentionally”. We could tell from the member’s slack-jawed face when I said we built four pipelines that he has spent too much time reading false Liberal talking points. The Enbridge Alberta Clipper was built over 1,600 kilometres. The TransCanada Keystone was built over 1,200 kilometres. There is also Enbridge Line 9B reversal and Kinder Morgan’s Anchor Loop: 1.2 million barrels a day as a result of these pipelines. I worked in the Harper government to build energy east, which the Liberal government killed with regulations after TransCanada spent $1 billion. What position would Canada be in today if we had energy east and the other LNG and oil pipelines that the government killed?”

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“The government fails every time it tries to invest public money, just like it did with its infrastructure bank. Its policies print money and cause inflation. I do not trust this government to invest our money properly.”

“Mr. Speaker, this sovereign debt fund is nothing new. The Liberal government has had funds like this before. One is the Canada Infrastructure Bank. The Canada Infrastructure Bank is supposed to disburse its $35‑billion capital envelope by 2027-28, but on July 10, the PBO reported it had disbursed only $14.9 billion and it was $21 billion short of its target. These Liberals fail every time they try to attract investment. There is nothing but failure that has followed this Prime Minister everywhere he has gone, whether it be the Bank of England or the Bank of Canada. He has printed money and caused inflation everywhere. People from Saskatchewan have seen this movie before where the government thinks it can invest their money better than they can, and it has ended in a complete failure and out-migration. I am scared to see the same thing happen to Canada, which I love. How can people trust this unethical, corrupt government to actually invest money properly?”

“The member said I made a false statement. I want him to tell me what I said that was false.”

“Mr. Speaker, the member said I made a false statement. I would like him to clarify what statement was false.”

“The government wants to create a 25-billion-dollar wealth fund using borrowed money. Canada does not have extra money to save because we are running a huge deficit. Real wealth funds are built on savings, not debt. Businesses are not building in Canada because taxes and rules are too high, not because there is no government money. The government should stop borrowing money for this fund, cut taxes, and remove red tape so businesses can invest on their own.”

“Mr. Speaker, there is an old joke about a man who racks up an enormous credit card debt, takes a second mortgage, opens a savings account and tells his wife it did not cost them anything. That joke is a pretty accurate description of the government’s economic policy, and we are all the wife. The Prime Minister has announced a $25-billion so-called sovereign wealth fund, and Canadians deserve a serious accounting of what has actually been put in front of them. Let us begin with the most fundamental question: What precisely is a sovereign wealth fund? A real one would be built on genuine surpluses. We heard in the House today about Norway. Norway’s government pension fund, the model the Prime Minister so eagerly name-drops, was capitalized by petroleum revenues. It has $1 trillion of assets because Norway saved when times were good. Canada is not Norway. Norway has oil money and Canada has vibes and a $25-billion credit card statement. We are running an almost $70-billion deficit in the current fiscal year alone, double the last guy’s, so we do not have surpluses to invest. We have deficits to finance, and $25-billion seed money in this fund is not savings. It is actually borrowed money any way we look at it. It is debt finance, like every other federal expenditure that exceeds our revenues. The Prime Minister is not building a wealth fund. He is building a debt fund, and he should be honest with Canadians about it. Let us be clear about what it means for every Canadian household. The government is borrowing at roughly 3.5% or 4% on 10-year bonds and betting that a bureaucratic Crown corporation run by political appointees will outperform the cost of that capital. It is leveraged speculation with taxpayer collateral, and not the nation building that the Prime Minister is suggesting it is. I have heard Liberal government members say that this fund will be different, that it will be more transparent, more accountable and better governed. I would feel more confident about that claim if they could tell us who is going to govern it, how the projects would be selected, when it would be operational and what relationship any of this would have to the Canada Infrastructure Bank or the Canada Growth Fund. They cannot answer any of those questions today, and we will see that throughout the day. I am certainly not alone in asking them. This announcement landed with a giant thud. The sovereign wealth fund proposal was met with near-universal skepticism, disbelief and, frankly, pure ridicule. The Globe and Mail, not exactly a Conservative voice in Canada, observed this week that the pension funds that presumably partner with this vehicle, including the Canada Pension Plan Investment Board, were not even consulted before this announcement was made. The CPP Investment Board, to its credit, said that the key to long-term success for any public investment institution is “a clear commercial mandate, strong governance, and operational independence.” That is a politely worded way of saying that it has concerns. We should have concerns, because the question cuts to the heart of this whole exercise. The fund’s mandate is politically directed toward domestic infrastructure such as ports, mines and trade corridors, with diversification explicitly not a priority. It is then not truly an investment fund at all. In the Globe’s words, it is an “off-balance sheet vehicle for fiscal policy.” That is a government wealth fund in a costume. It is actually just another government program. We have seen this movie before and we know how it ends. Sustainable Development Technology Canada, which members might remember now as the green slush fund, sent $400 million out to Liberal-backed pet projects with 186 identified conflicts of interest, zero accountability and zero measurable results. The Canada Infrastructure Bank was also endowed with $45 billion in infrastructure. It spent a fraction of that on actual construction while handing out $8 million in bonuses since 2024. The Prime Minister himself made these comparisons earlier this week. With respect, I do not think it is the endorsement he thinks it is. Here is a deeper problem. The reason that major projects are not getting built in Canada is not a lack of government capital, and that is the point here. There is not a lack of capital in Canada. They can ask anybody. If an infrastructure project is not moving forward, it is almost certainly because the private sector stakeholders have determined that it is not economically viable or because of the absurd regulatory environment. They have told us this. One does not solve an onerous regulatory environment by creating a new Crown corporation to fund projects the private sector stakeholders already said no to. One solves it by fixing the actual regulatory environment. Even industry leaders are telling the Financial Times, not a Conservative blog but the Financial Times of London, saying that the government’s red-tape cutting efforts are already floundering, costing more in lost trade than Trump’s tariffs ever did. Forestry executives are frustrated. People in the oil and gas sector are frustrated. Auto executives are frustrated. What do we do? We create another bypass around the dysfunction, instead of fixing the dysfunction itself. The Liberals have created an $18-billion-a-year regulatory burden. They have interprovincial trade barriers in place that knock $200 billion off our GDP. They are married to Bill C-69, the tanker ban, the policy uncertainty that has chased a trillion dollars out of this economy over the 10 years. Capital did not flee Canada because there was no government bank to subsidize it. It fled because it was simply unprofitable to do business here. A $25-billion Band-Aid applied over a gaping wound does not close the wound. It just becomes a really expensive Band-Aid that Canadians will end up paying for. There are real alternatives to this. We could genuinely cut taxes so that families have more in their pockets every single month and business owners have a reason to stay here or to open up their business here in the first place. We can eliminate red tape and trade barriers that cost hundreds of billions of dollars in lost economic activity every year. I just do not understand how that is never the solution that they go to. We could fast-track approvals and start building things rather than funding another Ottawa office to study the feasibility of someday perhaps getting something built. We could scrap the bad laws, including Bill C-69, the tanker ban and the industrial carbon tax. They are actively preventing pipelines, mines and LNG terminals from being constructed. That is not this side of the House saying that. That is the industry representatives themselves. None of this would require borrowing $25 billion of new money. All of it would create much more wealth than the government ever could. That is how to build a country, not on borrowed money funnelled through a Crown corporation whose governance, mandate and accountability mechanisms have yet to be designed but were announced first and with details to follow. Canadians get to pay the bill. This House is owed answers that the government has not provided. Who runs the fund? How much in terms of management fees did they get? On what criteria are projects approved? What prevents them from being another vehicle for the same Liberal patronage networks that have embarrassed the government repeatedly? We will keep asking those questions. We will keep being the voice of every single Canadian who can see clearly what this is. When this was announced, I could not find a whole lot of people who were excited about it, except for the members on the other side of the House. They keep telling Canadians that Canadians do not understand the potential of this and this is based on hope, but everything this would do is the opposite of what the government says it is going to do. It is going to spend borrowed money, pick winners and losers, mostly losers, in our own economy and distort the market. Canada’s federal deficit sits at 2.1% of GDP. It is higher than it was last year. That is not lower. That is going in the wrong direction. Interest on the debt is heading past $80 billion annually, double what it was just four years ago. I will close with a sincere request for the government. Put down the $25-billion chequebook, step away from the podium at the Canada Science and Technology Museum and try something truly novel the government could not do in over a decade. Get out of the way, so that private capital and private business could be put to work here once and for all.”

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“I oppose the government's plan for a wealth fund. It will not work because it interferes with the market instead of investing outside the country. The Liberals keep adding rules and subsidies that push business away, which has already caused one trillion dollars to leave Canada.”

“Mr. Speaker, I know that we are discussing the sovereign wealth fund today, but this is not what the government is proposing. In fact, the Liberals cannot even talk about it in their questions. The sovereign wealth fund, or the sovereign debt fund, that they are proposing is the exact opposite of one that would actually work. It would work in an economy where we have surpluses and resource revenue, and it would invest outside the country and not distort the market within the country by picking the very projects that make it unprofitable in the first place for businesses to invest. This is the problem with the Liberals’ government. Every single time, their solution is to come in and distort the market, regulate the market and subsidize the market so nobody can build here. That is evidenced by the $1 trillion of capital that has fled this country.”

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“The government is creating another new agency. These agencies mess with the free market. When private companies do not want to fund a project, the government steps in and pays for it anyway. That is not how a free market should work.”

“Mr. Speaker, it is always an interesting day here when we agree with the Bloc Québécois. This government has now put forward a 13th new bureaucracy. All of these bureaucracies have one thing in common: They are there to distort the market. Private companies chose not to invest in something, so the government comes and backfills that capital, which already exists in this country, by choosing the projects that go forward. That is the opposite of how a free market works. It is the opposite of how this country was built throughout generations. I cannot understand why the Liberal government always chooses the wrong path when it comes to building Canada’s future.”

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“The government's plan to save money using borrowed funds does not make sense. You cannot save for the future by taking on more debt.”

“Mr. Speaker, with regard to Norway’s sovereign wealth fund, I decided to do the same thing as the Prime Minister, because he is a wise person. I decided that what I would do is take the bulk of the money out of my credit card, put it in my savings account and call it “Scott’s retirement fund”. Then I went to my accountant, who said that I would never retire. I was wondering if the member could explain to me why that is.”

“The Liberals claim they are saving money, but they are still overspending. Canadians do not need a wealth fund. The government must stop borrowing money and make life affordable so Canadians do not have to put groceries on credit cards.”

“Mr. Speaker, that is what some people call “girl math”. I call it “Liberal math.” I have been guilty of doing the same thing. I see a very expensive thing that I absolutely cannot afford, and I buy it on sale when it is 5% off. I convince myself that I got all these savings for it. That is Liberal math. That is how the math works in this place. Canadians do not need a wealth fund. They need a government that is going to handle affordability in a responsible way and stop leveraging the national credit card so Canadians have to leverage theirs for groceries.”

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“The Liberals have hurt our economy with high taxes, huge deficits, and too many rules. Now they want to create a new wealth fund to pay for major projects. Other countries use surplus money for these funds, but Canada has a massive deficit. The government should cut taxes and red tape instead of creating more funds that pick winners and losers.”

“Mr. Speaker, like many Canadians, I remember a time when hard work paid off in Canada, when people could start a business or a family with hope for a bright and prosperous future, and when government did not stand in the way of businesses, pick winners and losers in industry and society, or tax Canadians, businesses and entrepreneurs at every turn. That was just over a decade ago, under the last Conservative government, led by Stephen Harper. Canada had a balanced budget and a $1‑billion surplus. Canada had the strongest economy in the G7, with the largest and most prosperous middle class in the world. That is the Canada the Liberals inherited. Since then, they have imposed punitive laws that landlock and roadblock Canadians, entrepreneurs, investors and inventors with costly red tape, mixed messages and constantly shifting policies and regulations. Today, the Prime Minister sits in the same chair he advised for the last half-decade, where he pushed policies that strangled the Canadian economy and drove $1 trillion of investment out of Canada and into the United States, which probably explains why he moved Brookfield south of the border. The results speak for themselves. After 11 years of this same Liberal government and a year of this Prime Minister with all the same key players, Canada now has the highest household debt, the most unaffordable housing, the lowest investment per worker, the second-worst productivity and the second-highest unemployment in the G7. The Prime Minister cannot blame global factors. Other countries face the same pressures and have responded with real action and secure trade deals, while the Liberals have responded with delay and confusion. Canadians are in this position because Liberal policies punish work and drive out investment for anti-development ideology and government control. How do the Liberals respond? Well, they set up another half-baked scheme. This week, the Prime Minister announced a so-called sovereign wealth fund or, as he calls it, “a people’s fund”. I wonder if that name came from his visit to Beijing. In this long, drawn-out, rhetorical photo op, he said that this fund would finance major projects in Canada, because nothing says free enterprise like a government fund that looks like top-down state control, does it? However, he did point out Norway and Singapore as examples. Let us look at his claims and how they compare to his plan for Canada. Norway, of course, is a unitary state, with a single centralized government. It runs consistent budget surpluses, because it develops its abundant resources, especially oil and gas, which drives its economy, creates jobs and funds strong public services without crushing taxpayers. In fact, Norway’s budget surplus is one of the largest in the world and far exceeds the OECD average. The Norwegian government then puts that extra wealth into their sovereign wealth fund. Singapore, which the Prime Minister also mentioned, is a small city-state that built a highly attractive business environment with low taxes and minimal red tape that draws investment, jobs and businesses. Singapore has low corporate tax rates, big tax exemptions, no capital gains tax, and a highly efficient, transparent and independent legal system for permitting and contract enforcement. It competes for investment; it does not chase it away. Oh, and it has a big budget surplus, too. The Singaporean government puts that wealth into their sovereign wealth fund. Now, let us look at Canada. The Prime Minister said that he would saddle Canada with a budget deficit of $66.9 billion, which is double Trudeau’s. If it requires further clarity, that is the opposite of a surplus. The Prime Minister also revealed that debt interest charges alone will be $59 billion annually, and that will rise by 50%, up to $80 billion, in 2030. Of course, it does not stop there. The Liberals’ $264‑million Major Projects Office has approved zero projects. There is no start date, deadline, start point, end point or really any clear material progress on the Prime Minister’s promised pipeline to the Pacific, and Liberal red tape still drives business out of Canada. Just this week, business leaders said that Liberal anti-development laws are worse for Canada than Trump’s tariffs. François Poirier, CEO of TC Energy, said, “Capital goes where it is welcome. And for too long, it hasn’t felt welcome here”. David Pierce, from the Canadian Chamber of Commerce, said, “I’ve heard of resource projects that require hundreds of permits, due to federal, provincial and municipal requirements”. He tells the truth. Enbridge, North America’s top pipeline company, said, “changes in policy and regulatory environment need to happen”, not only for a new pipeline but “for producers to have confidence to increase production”. Not really an attractive business climate, is it? Under these Liberals, Canada does not have a budget surplus; caused a historic capital flight, especially to the U.S., which started in 2015 and has gotten worse every year since; and does not develop or export the full potential of Canada’s resources, either for Canadians here at home or for allies abroad. In fact, this government blocks projects, landlocks production, bans exports and then wonders why investment leaves. There really was no point at all to compare Canada’s alleged sovereign wealth fund, which is clearly a sovereign debt fund, to Norway or to Singapore, other than to make it seem like the Liberals have a good plan, but it is just an illusion. What wealth is actually going into this so-called wealth fund? It seems like the Prime Minister had an idea. One could say it is the Liberals’ old reliable. They will, of course, take Canadians’ money, just like they always do, because, when in doubt, they will just tax Canadians out: out of their homes, out of their businesses and, in the very end, all the way out of Canada. He said that if Canadians had a bit of extra money, they could give it to him, just a few bucks here or there, because he needs more of their money. He thinks he has not taken enough of it. For the Liberals, it is always “spend first, tax everyone and everything later”. Why does he want our money? What is the point of this sovereign debt fund in the first place? It seems to be so the Prime Minister will have the power to bankroll hand-picked projects while claiming it is independent. He will be able to pick winners of a few and make losers of the rest in Canada’s economy. He will make sure, once and for all, that the lucky few who tow Liberal talking points and parrot his globalist, European, neo-Marxist agenda get to rake it in, so they can hire the top consultants, line their pockets and add just a few more zeros to their big fat bonuses. As for the rest, they get shut out and drowned in anti-development laws, regulations and taxes. They get told to go wait at the back of the line, while the Prime Minister holds the door open for his big banker elite buddies, his cronies, all the guys who helped get him to where he is today. As Dan Kelly, president of the Canadian Federation of Independent Business, said, “every other unwashed business owner [is] stuck in the old, unworkable system.” Meanwhile, food banks get 2.2 million visits per month, double from seven years ago. Canadians are forced to sacrifice basics and put food back on the shelves. More young Canadians lose hope as to whether they will ever be able to get a home, start a family or get ahead, no matter how hard they work. Another bureaucracy is not the solution to $1 trillion in lost investment. Another bureaucracy is not the solution to lost opportunities across Canada after a decade of the Liberals, but to them it appears to be. They have created the Canada Infrastructure Bank, the Growth Fund, the Major Projects Office, the defence bank and the green slush fund, but Canada still has the worst investment record in the G7. Those have not worked so far. Why do the Liberals expect that another one will? We know the definition of insanity. This is more bureaucracy, another fund with no delivered results for Canadians, but words that sound good. What they have delivered are more offices funded by taxpayers and more executives who get six-figure salaries while everyone else suffers. Instead of pouring more money into a broken system, the Liberals should fix their own laws and regulations that broke it in the first place, but why would they? As long as the Liberals are in total control, with their laws, policies, taxes and red tape, they can extort private businesses and provinces to get their way and to implement their agenda so the Prime Minister can make sure that his agenda to creep more into Canadians’ lives, into provincial, territorial and municipal jurisdiction, and into Canada’s private sector will be put into place. It sounds like a certain Communist regime to me. After all, he seems much more comfortable now cozying up to Beijing, as he lets their EVs on Canadian streets, even though they spy on Canadians and interfere in Canadian elections, academia, social media, law enforcement, defence and natural resources. The whole point of a private sector, of a free economy, is supposed to be freedom from government interference, the freedom for businesses to prosper and to create jobs without being taxed to high heavens, since lower taxes actually always result in more government revenue, so that Canadians can build good lives without the need to survive on government programs. That is necessary, also, to ensure that supports for vulnerable Canadians who really need a safety net can be sustainable. That is why Conservatives will fight every day for affordable and abundant Canadian energy and exports, low inflation and low taxes by cutting the cost of government, free market competition, and a self-reliant, sovereign and secure Canada. Life does not have to be this way. In a country as rich in natural and human resources as Canada, no business should be driven out and no family should have to choose between heating their home and feeding their kids. The beauty of Canada, its resilience, is the diversity of regions, resources and people who work, live and co-operate free of government micromanagement, who build a nation on hard work and share in opportunity and prosperity to pass on something stronger and better to the next generation, not controlled by Ottawa, not held back by red tape, but driven by hard work, innovation and pride in what Canadians can build ourselves and in who we are. That is what Conservatives will fight for every day.”

• Echo ×7

  A repeated line

  “The second-lowest productivity in the G7 and the second-highest unemployment in the G7.”

  Said 7 times by 3 members since April 30.

  Every time it was said →

“The member should talk about policy instead of attacking our motives. She needs to explain how this fund works, who runs it, and how it helps Canadians who cannot afford food or housing.”

“Mr. Speaker, let me give the member some advice right off the top. I think she should actually engage in the policy discussion here instead of impugning the motives of duly and equally elected people who represent hundreds of thousands of Canadians and care about our country exactly as much as, and maybe more than, every single other person, which is why we are fighting so hard to save it. I think that as a Liberal government member, she should stand up here and explain all the details about the fund: exactly how it would work, who would run it and what it would do for Canadians who cannot afford to pay rent or their mortgage, or to feed themselves, people who have to ration their basics and live in sacrifice because that is what the government has made them do. It is the member’s job to stand up to answer those questions.”

“Canada now gets the least private business investment among rich countries because of high taxes and rules. Other countries build big energy projects in months. Our new office for major projects has built nothing in nine months.”

“Mr. Speaker, my colleague from Lakeland is exactly right. Eleven years ago, we had the richest, most prosperous middle class in the world here in Canada, but we have moved a long way from that. Canada has the lowest private sector investment in our economy of all the OECD countries because of the regulatory and tax burden that is choking and chasing away investment. I would like the member to comment on the fact that it has been nine months since the Major Projects Office was approved in legislation, and zero shovels are in the ground, yet Germany built an LNG intake facility in 6.5 months, the Netherlands in six months and Finland in four months.”

“The government's major projects office is not working. It has not helped build any projects, cut red tape, or made it easier to trade between provinces. Instead, Canadian money is leaving for the United States, and the government is breaking its promises.”

“Mr. Speaker, I thank the member for all his advocacy for energy development and for making life more affordable for every single Canadian in every part of the country. Of course he is exactly right. The Major Projects Office is just the latest example of big promises and great rhetoric of the government’s trying to pretend it is new compared to the exact same one that it was, which had driven out investment. In fact, the member raises a major point. In 2015, and I wonder what happened then, it the first time in Canadian history that capital from Canada started to flow into the U.S., rather than the other way around, and it has gotten worse every year since. Here we are, a year out, and the Major Projects Office has not designated a single project in the national interest. Most of the projects it is announcing have already been built, and most have already gone through regulators or their provincial jurisdiction. There are a bunch of others for which nobody has any idea what is going to happen. There are a hundred people who are making a lot of money, and the Liberals have not delivered on a single thing in terms of their promises for getting major projects built or for cutting red tape and interprovincial trade barriers. That is the problem. They—”

“The Liberals waste money on funds that do not help anyone while life gets more expensive. Opposition parties should unite and make the government explain its plans. Right now, 71 projects are stuck waiting for approval from regulators.”

“Mr. Speaker, we entirely agree. The Liberals have created constant chaos, uncertainty and confusion with fund after fund that is not delivering any positive results in any way whatsoever. Life just keeps getting more and more expensive for everyday Canadians. I think all opposition parties need to unite in pushing the Liberals to tell them exactly what they are going to do. I think they are going to pick winners and losers in every part of this country, this society and the economy according to their own total-control agenda, which they are showing is what they want to do here in the House of Commons. In addition, related to another comment, do members know that there are 71 proponents in front of three Canadian regulators right now, and that they are all stuck, waiting around and not getting fast-tracked in any way whatsoever, no matter what the—”