“I want the government to cancel its plan for a 25-billion-dollar sovereign wealth fund. We have a huge deficit, so the government would have to borrow all of that money. That debt will drive up prices and hand cash to rich corporate insiders. Instead of borrowing money to pick winners, the government should cut taxes and red tape so private businesses can build and invest.”

“moved: That, given that, (i) sovereign wealth funds must have wealth that comes from budget surpluses and resource revenues, (ii) this government has run no surpluses, only deficits for the last 11 years and has no funds to invest, (iii) the Prime Minister is proposing to put his 25-billion-dollar fund on the national credit card, which will cause further inflationary pressure, (iv) the Prime Minister has already created 12 new Crown corporations, agencies and bureaucracies, (v) when government directs capital, it always goes to the politically powerful and not the deserving, (vi) there is over 1 trillion dollars in pension fund money that Liberals have pushed out of Canada that we could bring back with faster permits, lower taxes and free enterprise, (vii) the rising cost of fuel and food is already burdening hard working Canadians who cannot afford to pay more for handouts to Liberal insiders and corporate elites, therefore, the House call on the government to abandon this sovereign debt fund. He said: Mr. Speaker, today I am responding to the costly, gimmicky schemes of the Prime Minister, who now wants to put $25 billion on the national credit card to fund handouts for well-connected businesses, Liberal elites, and co-operative forces, all while increasing the cost of living for everyone: workers, small businesses, and seniors. We have seen that this Liberal government has already racked up 11 deficits on the national credit card. After a year of this Prime Minister, we are seeing higher costs, more debt, higher taxes, and more money on the credit card. He is just another Liberal. To have a sovereign wealth fund, there need to be funds. There are no funds because there is no surplus, unlike in Saudi Arabia, Singapore, Norway, and so on. These countries have surpluses every year, which they set aside as savings for their countries. They have no deficits. The Conservatives want to remove government barriers in order to attract private investment again, boost our economy and pay our bills through private production. That way, the cost of living will come down for Canadians who are already paying too much. That is how we will free up our economy and restore affordability. We will be strong at home and masters in our own house. Imagine someone went into their doctor’s office, and suddenly the doctor injected them with some strange substance. They asked what it was, and he said that it was a poison. They then asked why he had injected them with a poison. Immediately he pulled out another syringe and injected them with an antidote, and he said he did that so he could save their life with the antidote. They asked why he had done any of it in the first place, and they were told that he wanted to save their life because that is what he does. That is exactly how Liberal economics work. The Liberals do massive economic damage to our country, and then they claim to be its solution, its antidote. The government blocks homebuilding with taxes and red tape then sets up a fourth federal housing agency to subsidize housing. The Liberal Prime Minister blocks resource projects with high taxes, 19‑year permitting delays, and bans on oil shipping off the B.C. coast, and then he creates massive new offices to get projects built, which promise carve-outs, bail-outs and handouts to favourite businesses. The Prime Minister blocks investments with high taxes, drives $1.2 trillion of pension funds out of the country and then subsidizes investment with new corporate welfare programs. He drives up the cost of living and the cost of food with inflationary money printing, carbon taxes and red tape, then prints even more money to give people cash payments to help them with the cost of the food, which he inflated. He blocks development, taxes production, regulates investment, delays permits, drives capital away, kills projects and crushes builders. Then, when the economy slows down, the Prime Minister shows up with a subsidy, a fund, a bank, a summit, a task force and a photo op to solve the very problem he caused. Instead of just following the Hippocratic oath to do no harm, the government does plenty of harm and then claims that it provides the cure. Like the great Ronald Reagan said, if it moves, a Liberal taxes it. If it keeps moving, he regulates it, and when it stops moving, he subsidizes it. Why not just get out of the way and let things move? Why not let the builder build, the worker work, the investor invest, the farmer farm, the miner mine, the manufacturer manufacture and the trucker truck? It is because then there would be no role for the Liberal politician, no power, no control, no permit to authorize and no cheque to hand out. If people could just launch a business, produce resources, grow food and build homes, the Prime Minister and the people within his castle walls would be irrelevant. Instead he forces everything to go through him. He basically creates a regulatory prison and charges a ransom for anyone who wants to build something to get out of it. If they want a place to live or food in their stomach, they have to wait for the government to send back some of their money. If they want to build a home or a pipeline, they have to kneel before the king and seek his good graces. If they want investment for their enterprise, they have to bow before the state. State-controlled crony capitalism is how the Liberal Prime Minister enriched himself. In fact, his Brookfield investments profit off government favours that typically help a tiny group of politically powerful but unproductive takers at the expense of the great mass of productive makers. Help is the sunny side of control. It is the illusion of action from the people who caused the problem, the illusion of investment from the people who drove the investment away and the illusion of growth from those who blocked the growth because, in this Liberal model, the economy does not belong to the people; it belongs to the politicians, bureaucrats and other authorities who control it and the powers that influence them. The real debate in our economy today is that of a political economy versus a market economy. A political economy allocates wealth based on power. A market economy allocates wealth based on free choice. Enter the sovereign wealth fund, which has no wealth. It is another Liberal illusion. Countries with real sovereign wealth funds, such as Singapore, Norway, Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates, accumulate surpluses year after year, which they then squirrel away and invest to grow bigger returns for their people. The Liberal Prime Minister has no surplus to invest. In fact, the net equity of the government is negative $1.3 trillion. If we take all the assets and deduct all the liabilities, that is what is left. We call that our national debt. Just two days ago, the Prime Minister announced that he is running the 11th Liberal deficit, which is being put on the national credit card. There is more debt, more taxes and more costs on the credit card. The Prime Minister is just another Liberal. In fact, he has doubled the deficit since Trudeau left office, so he has no wealth to put into the wealth fund. He has something else: debt. He wants to put $25 billion more on our national credit card to invest in politically connected companies. Who will get the money? It is those with the political power. The Liberal Prime Minister plans to hold yet another summit, this time with multinational corporations and billionaires, to offer them access to government money and allow them to circumvent the brutal red tape and taxes he imposes on all other businesses. He will demand that these businesses, which will ultimately get permits to go ahead and get around the restrictive red tape and taxes, will give the government an ownership stake. It is almost like charging a ransom for letting them out of the regulatory prison he has created. The million or so small businesses without lobbyists will still be stuck in that regulatory prison, forced to pay taxes to subsidize their larger, more politically powerful competitors. It is the golden rule: Those with the gold make the rules. The small elite turns power into wealth, wealth back into more power and then more power back into more wealth. The cycle continues until they have it all. They get richer, making everyone else poorer. In a political economy, the elite profit not by having the best product, but by having the best lobbyists. It is not how much value they create for customers. It is how much influence they have over ministers, regulators, agencies and insiders. The most important commodities in the political economy are influence and power. In a market economy, people get ahead by serving the people. We sell a product only if someone wants to buy it. We hire a worker only if the worker freely chooses the job and the employer values the work. We attract investment only if we can prove that we can create more value tomorrow than we will consume today. That is the magic of the free market. People cannot get ahead without making someone else better off. We know that because they would not engage in the voluntary transaction if it did not make them better off. That is why, in a free market, when one buys something and says “thank you” to the vendor, the vendor often does not say “you are welcome”. They say “thank you” back. This is because the seller values the money more than what they sold and the buyer values the product more than what they paid. If someone wants an apple and has an orange, and I want an orange and have an apple, and we trade, we still have an apple and an orange between us, but we are both richer because each of us has something worth more to us than what we had before; thus the double “thank you” when we trade. By contrast, a state-controlled economy is based entirely on force. Everything the government does, it does by force because taxation is mandatory and not voluntary. That is why no one ever writes “thank you” on their tax form. The transaction was imposed. Even if it was a good transaction, it was not a free one. Free exchange allows work for wages, product for payment and investment for interest. It is free people making free choices and building a free country. By contrast, a government-controlled economy works differently. As I said, it operates by coercion, and in relationships of coercion, the strongest always win and the weakest always get crushed. The Prime Minister quoted Thucydides in his Davos speech, saying that the strong do what they will and the weak do what they must. The government taxes, regulates and blocks the productive economy, then uses our own money to create programs that promise to fix the damage it caused. This is not Robin Hood. It is the sheriff of Nottingham. It takes from the workers, builders, taxpayers and investors, running their money through bureaucracy, consultants, lobbyists and insiders, and lets a few drops trickle back down to the people who paid for it in the first place. This is state-controlled crony capitalism, a system where government concentrates money in fewer hands based on power, and where most businesses and citizens never have the political clout needed to get a meeting, win a carve-out, secure a subsidy or escape that regulatory prison. Make no mistake, regulatory prison is what it is. If someone wants to build a mine or a pipeline, they must wait. If they want to build a home, they must wait. If they want to build a port, a road, a transmission line, a factory, a terminal, a refinery or a railway, they must wait, fill out the forms, hire consultants, lobby a minister, please the regulator and win some political influence. Maybe they will then have a chance. After years of delay, they might get government support, as the Prime Minister likes to call it. If a project is good enough to receive regulatory support, why not just approve it in the first place? Why should a company have to win over a politician to get something built? Why should a project have to give up a piece of its ownership to the state in order to escape the prison of heavy regulations? This is the model the Liberal Prime Minister believes in, and that is because it is the model that enriched him in the first place, not by doing business in the marketplace, but by using political power to get favours for his company. We remember that the Prime Minister pushed for heat pump subsidies. Well, Brookfield sells heat pumps. We remember that he pushed for money-printing inflation. Well, the CEO of Brookfield confirmed on May 20 of last year that Brookfield profits off of inflation, saying, “many of our things are regulated, rate-based or contractual in nature, and inflation is actually a positive to the numbers, so as inflation comes in, it actually helps the revenue streams of those businesses”. The Prime Minister said a little over a year ago that he had successfully lobbied for a more expensive form of so-called sustainable aviation fuel right before Brookfield, his company, invested a billion dollars in that same fuel, forcing Canadian passengers to pay higher airline fees for this more pricey fuel, which his company then profited from. This is not business; this is political manipulation. It raises the cost for everyone, especially those who do not have political power. That is the difference between the real economy and the protected economy. In the real economy, inflation crushes families. It raises grocery bills. It raises rent and mortgage payments. It costs people more for gas, heat and electricity. It shuts young people out of home ownership and starting families. In a political economy, inflation can be used as a revenue tool for elites and schemers. The government creates the rule. The rule creates the market. The insider sees the rule coming. The insider invests, and the consumer pays the politically connected profit. Everyone else is told that this is progress. Canadians will pay the price through higher inflation at the grocery store, taxes on their paycheques and debt interest for future generations. We have seen this movie before. I just mentioned that there is going to be a big summit where a whole series of multinationals and billionaires will come and feast on this $25 billion. This is not a new idea. In 2016, the Liberal government hosted another international summit of investors at a Shangri‑La hotel to unveil the Infrastructure Bank, a $45‑billion pot of gold that went to subsidizing the investments of insiders. Here we are, 10 years later, and a Liberal government is holding the same kind of summit to allow the same elites to feast on the same debt. Since the creation of the Infrastructure Bank, it has lost hundreds of millions of dollars. For its first seven years, its investment income failed to cover even its operating costs. The Parliamentary Budget Officer found that, when all levels of government were included, two out of every three dollars used for projects funded by the bank came from the taxpayer, not from businesses. Taxpayers lost and insiders won. The bank spent a quarter of a billion dollars on operations. The CEO makes $600,000 a year. It paid out $8 million in bonuses in one year. That is why a parliamentary committee studied it thoroughly and recommended it be eliminated. Now, instead of doing that, the Liberals are augmenting it with yet another slush fund. Then, in September of 2024, the then Liberal finance minister Chrystia Freeland pledged to create a Canada growth fund, seeded with taxpayers’ dollars, to try to bring back the $1.2 trillion of pension funds that the Liberal government had driven abroad. Who was tapped to administer that fund? It was Brookfield. That was barely two years ago, and here we go again. There is another summit, another fund, another transition office and another name for the same old Liberal idea. There is an illusion of change, but the reality is that it is more of the same. Desjardins wrote that the proposed fund draws strong parallels to the Infrastructure Bank. The Montreal Economic Institute called it “essentially the Canadian Infrastructure Bank under a different name.” It is the same poison with a new label, more costs, more corruption, more debt, more taxes and more on the credit card. The Liberal Prime Minister is just another Liberal. We have seen how we can build wealth when we unlock the power of the free enterprise system. The answer is not to weigh the economy down with even more government agencies on top of the countless number that already existed a year ago, and the 13 new ones that the Prime Minister has since created. We need to unblock and unlock the potential of our resources and our people. The answer is more economic freedom, such as the freedom to build, to produce, to hire, to invest and to compete. We must replace an economy of carve-outs, handouts and bailouts for insiders with free choice, opportunity and affordability. If a project is safe, lawful and in the national interest, just approve it. If a company can build without taxpayers’ money, let it build now. If workers can build bigger paycheques by producing energy, minerals, food, homes, steel, aluminum, copper and more, we need to get the government out of the way and let them do it. Let businesses compete for customers, not political favour. Let entrepreneurs win with the best product, not the best lobbyists. Let workers earn a powerful paycheque, not wait for government handouts. Let Canadians build sovereign wealth, not borrow sovereign debt. This is the choice: state-controlled crony capitalism, where political influence becomes the most valuable commodity, or a free market where work, savings, risk-taking and service create prosperity for everyone. The options are a top-down, state-controlled, crony capitalist system or a bottom-up, merit-based, free enterprise system. A political aristocracy or an economic meritocracy is the choice. We want this to be a country that restores the promise to the people that anyone who works hard can enjoy an affordable home, a safe street, good food on the table and realize their dreams. We want a country where our people get ahead by having the best product and the best work, not by having the most political influence. We do not want a country of bureaucrats and busybodies, of gatekeepers and grifters, of tax collectors and toll masters. We want a country of artists and adventurers, entrepreneurs and explorers, workers and warriors, pioneers and patriots. That is the country we seek to build. Now, let us get to building.”

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  “After 11 years of the Liberal government.”

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“I have been right about the economy for 22 years, and the Prime Minister has been wrong. He was wrong about the carbon tax, stopping pipelines, and inflation. How can he be wrong so often?”

“Mr. Speaker, there he goes again. The member has been giving the same speech on the same Liberal side for the last decade. He speaks, and the reality— An hon. member: As you have done for 22 years. Hon. Pierre Poilievre: Mr. Speaker, for 22 years, on every single economic issue, I have been proven right. On every single economic issue, the Liberal Prime Minister has been proven wrong. The Prime Minister was wrong to say that we needed bigger and broader carbon taxes. He was wrong to say that we needed to keep 50% of our oil in the ground. He was wrong to testify before a parliamentary committee against the northern gateway pipeline, which would be moving $30 billion of oil overseas today, had the government not blocked it. He was wrong to say that we would have deflation after COVID. He was wrong to say that money printing would not cause inflation. He was wrong just weeks ago when he said that affordability is the best it has been in the decade. How is it that he has been so wrong for so long?”

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“Norway can have a wealth fund because it saves its oil money and has budget surpluses. Canada cannot do that because we run deficits every year. The government will have to borrow money to make these investments, which is risky and irresponsible.”

“Mr. Speaker, I would like to thank the member for his compliment about the expression I used in French, “patente à gosses”. Every day, I try to learn a little more of the language of Molière. A little poetry can sometimes be a delight. The difference is that Norway’s sovereign wealth fund contains funds. It is simple. We do not have any funds here. The people of Norway have surpluses because they take revenue from the oil industry, which makes up 25% of their economy, and they put that revenue in a fund and invest it. Here in Canada, we do not have surpluses. We have deficits year after year. The government is just going to put this investment on the credit card. It is taking big risks with money that belongs to future generations by charging this to the credit card. That is irresponsible, and it is the opposite of what the folks in Norway do.”

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“More Canadian businesses have closed than opened for six straight quarters. Owners are leaving the country because of high taxes, bad rules, and permit delays. I want to know if this fund will fix those problems.”

“Mr. Speaker, we have seen the statistics. We in Canada now have had six consecutive quarters of more businesses shutting down than opening up. It is an entrepreneurial drought. Of course, these are the Canadians who have been grinding it out, opening early, closing late and making personal sacrifices. They cite regulatory uncertainty, delays in permitting and overtaxation. These are the Canadian dollars that are actually leaving the country. My question for the member is, does he think this fund will fix those issues?”

“More businesses are closing in Canada than opening, and money is leaving the country. Canadian business owners are now opening more businesses in the United States instead of here. The government's investment summit will only help big multinational corporations, not small Canadian businesses.”

“Mr. Speaker, that is an excellent question. The member is quite right. For six consecutive quarters, there have been more businesses that have closed than opened in Canada. A recent survey showed there are twice as many Canadian businesses that opened in 2024 outside of Canada than inside of Canada. For the elbows-up crowd in the room, Canadians are now opening more businesses in the United States than they are opening in Canada. In the last decade, $1 trillion of net investment has flowed out of our country. A majority of Canadian pension funds are, according to Statistics Canada, invested abroad and not here at home, a problem that has worsened since the Prime Minister took office. Now, the question was very particular: Would the million small businesses across this country benefit? Of course not. They will not be invited to the investment summit. It will just be for large multinational corporations that have political power. Small businesses that serve customers will lose. Multinationals that serve politicians in power will win.”

“Canada's economy has not grown in ten years. It is doing worse than all other G7 countries. The government has not fixed taxes or cut bad rules, and the deficit has doubled. People can already invest in businesses if they want to. The government should not force them to take on $25 billion in debt to give money to powerful corporations.”

“Mr. Speaker, there is no prosperity and growth to participate in. This economy has not grown in a decade. In fact, Canada has had the worst economic performance of all G7 countries. Since the Liberal Prime Minister took office, nothing has changed. There has been no regulatory reform and no tax reform, and not a single antidevelopment law has been eliminated. Other than to rename the carbon tax as the clean fuel standard, there has been no serious tax reform. Finally, and I guess it is the only difference, the deficit is twice the size now of what it was under Justin Trudeau. Now, as for participating in growing the Canadian economy, people have the freedom right now to buy into a Canadian stock index if they want to do that. I do not understand why they need the government to force them to take on a $25-billion liability on the credit card for the Liberal government to dole out, in a political slush fund, to those politically powerful corporations.”

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  “Since the Liberal Prime Minister took office.”

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“The Prime Minister is hurting the economy with high taxes and too many rules. He picks a few favoured businesses to get special help and avoid regulations, while ignoring small businesses. He should let the free market work so all businesses can do well.”

“Mr. Speaker, the Prime Minister wants to be king of the economy. He is holding on to all kinds of regulations that are hurting businesses. Businesses that are getting ahead are being slapped down with hefty taxes, except for a small group personally chosen by the Prime Minister. The member is absolutely right: Under the law, these powers all belong to the Prime Minister. That is no exaggeration. These special businesses will be able to sidestep all the rules and receive subsidies and gifts from the fund, which opens the door to corruption and leaves millions of small businesses out in the cold. Why not open up the free market so that all businesses can prosper?”

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“This fund is paid for with borrowed money. It adds to our national debt and will hurt our children's future.”

“Mr. Speaker, my question to the hon. Leader of the Opposition is about the fact that this fund is, basically, being funded on the taxpayers’ credit cards. We are already paying to service our national debt, and this will just add to it. Going forward, it is going to have an impact on the hon. leader’s children, my daughter and the youth in this country being able to live a prosperous life in the future.”

“The government is spending 60 billion dollars a year on debt interest. That costs each family 3,400 dollars this year, and it is growing fast. We must balance the budget and control spending.”

“Mr. Speaker, it is now $60 billion of annual interest, money for bankers and bondholders, not doctors and nurses, and $3,400 from every family will go to pay interest on the federal debt this year. That number will go up by 50% over the next five years. This is the fastest-growing item on the government’s budget right now: interest on the debt. It will enrich the bankers and the bondholders at the expense of hard-working people and threaten the future of our kids. That is why we need to restore fiscal responsibility, balanced budgets and controlled spending.”

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“Canada has lots of natural resources and should be rich. Instead, 10 years of Liberal rule have left us in deep debt. Where will the money for this wealth fund come from?”

“Mr. Speaker, it is fascinating to me. As Conservatives, we believe Canada is one of the greatest countries in the world, and we should be the wealthiest country in the world. We have unlimited natural resources. We are the envy of the entire world when it comes to our energy resources, yet here we are in massive deficits run for 10 years by Liberal governments. Where does the member think the wealth should come from for this so-called wealth fund?”

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  “Canada should be the wealthiest country in the world.”

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“Governments should only invest extra money they already have, not borrowed money. When governments try to run businesses with borrowed money, they lose millions of dollars.”

“Mr. Speaker, people in Saskatchewan have lived through this nightmare before: “Trust us; the government can do it better.” This reminds me of the NDP in the 1990s and early 2000s in Saskatchewan, when the government invested money from Crown corporations and taxpayers’ dollars in things like Spudco, where it lost $30 million, things like Navigata, where it lost $12 million, and things like mega bingo, where it could not even run a bingo properly and lost $14 million. The member just mentioned that a lot of different funds in Canada and around the world are similar to this. The big difference, and the part that he left out and that all Liberals will leave out, is that those were all built on surplus budgets. Alberta’s, for example, started in 1972, under former premier Peter Lougheed, when he had surpluses. Now that fund is $32 billion, at the start of 2025, built on surpluses. Why do the Liberals not understand that governments build money when they have it, not borrow money?”

“Which one of the Prime Minister's banker friends will be chosen to run this fund?”

“Mr. Speaker, I have a very simple question. Which one of the Prime Minister’s banker buddies is going to be the CEO of this fund?”

“I want to ask my colleague about Canadians investing. People are not choosing to invest their own money here. The government is just taking it from tax dollars.”

“Mr. Speaker, it would be amusing if the truth and the reality were not so sad. I would like to get my hon. colleague’s comments on what the previous speaker said about how Canadians want to have the opportunity to invest. In this situation, does he believe people will not be voluntarily contributing money? It is the government taking from our tax dollars to do it, and that is a completely different perspective from what the Liberals are proposing.”

“Experts and a parliamentary committee say we do not need the Canada Infrastructure Bank and should get rid of it. Does the member agree that Canadians do not need this new sovereign wealth fund?”

“Mr. Speaker, the Montreal Economic Institute said, “We don’t need a Canada Infrastructure Bank 2.0”. The Standing Committee on Transport, Infrastructure and Communities recommended “[t]hat the Government of Canada abolish the Canada Infrastructure Bank.” With this in mind, does the member agree that Canadians do not need this sovereign wealth fund?”

“The Canada Infrastructure Bank is not open about how it works, and it gives good deals to Liberal friends. Are we going to see the same problem with the new fund?”

“Mr. Speaker, I thank my colleague from the transport and infrastructure committee for his excellent speech. As we have mentioned in committee, and as he has mentioned many times in committee, we are pointing out the lack of transparency with the Canada Infrastructure Bank, the many connections to Liberal insiders that seem to be at play and, of course, the very favourable terms that are given to projects of those insiders. Does he worry that, with the sovereign debt fund, we are going down that exact same road? Can he elaborate more on that?”

“I am dividing our party's remaining speaking times in half.”

“Mr. Speaker, I would like to give notice under Standing Order 43(2)(a) that all remaining Conservative caucus speaking slots are hereby divided in two.”

“The government's economic update shows it is spending too much and running huge deficits. It is borrowing hundreds of billions of dollars and will soon spend $80 billion a year just on interest. That money should go to health care and tax cuts instead of paying off debt.”

“Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to stand today to speak about the spring economic update. Before I begin that, I want to reiterate what a privilege and an honour it is to represent the wonderful people of Aurora—Oak Ridges—Richmond Hill, a very vibrant, diverse and dynamic community in the heart of the GTA. Today, we are debating the spring economic update. I want to give a little context as to where we are. The Liberal government was re-elected on April 28 of last year. We were waiting with bated breath to see the first budget come out. We thought it would come out in May or June at the latest. Given that the fiscal year started on April 1, we thought that it would be prudent to at least present the budget a couple of months in, given that the election delayed that a bit, but no, the Liberal government decided that it would be best to present the budget to the House of Commons, to Parliament, a good seven months after the fiscal year had begun. In essence, seven months after it had spent seven-twelfths of the money in the budget that it was to present, which of course makes no sense at all and certainly does not make any sense to Canadians who know that one cannot spend money before one earns it or has the right to spend it. Nonetheless, the Liberals presented their budget with much fanfare, an omnibus project in a book that was some-464 pages, I believe, which showed that they were continuing more of the same kind of leadership they had learned over the years from the prime ministership of Justin Trudeau. Of course, we know that there is not much change on the other side, because most of the ministers were Trudeau ministers. We were not expecting much change, but we thought that with a new Prime Minister touting a résumé of economic and banking credentials, we would see something somewhat different. Unfortunately, what we saw was more of the same deficits year after year, giving very little hope to Canadians that the Canadian economy would turn around anytime soon. Nonetheless, the budget was presented in the House and debated. We went back and forth, and then we waited with much anticipation for this new document that the finance minister presented in the House on Tuesday of this week, which he titled “Canada Strong For All: Spring Economic Update 2026”. I thought, “Maybe there is something in this. Maybe they needed more time to get it right and get it together.” Then I was further encouraged, as were Canadians, because the day before this was presented, the Prime Minister went to the media and said that we were going to have “good news” from the finance minister. The day when the economic update was presented at four o’clock in the afternoon, literally 90 minutes before this document was presented in the House, every single Liberal minister or secretary of state responding to questions in question period made sure that they got the following words in: that within the next hour and a half, we would hear “good news” from the finance minister. I thought, “There has to be something good here.” I waited for him to get up, as did all of us in the House and many Canadians across the country who were hoping for some pocketbook relief for them, their families, communities and businesses from coast to coast to coast in this country. Then the finance minister started speaking and these books were distributed to all parliamentarians. We quickly looked through to get the summary. What did we see? We saw deficit after deficit, year after year. In fact, the previous prime minister, who the current Prime Minister considers a mentor, only had a $31-billion deficit projected for this year. This document came out, and the finance minister announced with much fanfare that it was good news for Canada that we were going to lose $67 billion. The only person who uttered that was him. Then, of course, there was resounding applause from the Liberals, very happy and thrilled that Canadians and the Government of Canada were going to lose another $67 billion. I scanned through the book to see what their projections were. I thought maybe, just maybe, it was just this year, but no. Over the next five years, they are projecting loss after loss, indebting Canadians an additional $363 billion. There is no hope for turning the economy around, no hope for making life more affordable for Canadians. In fact, we then see they are borrowing all this money. They cannot print the money; they are borrowing it from banks and financial institutions. One would assume they are borrowing from Canadian banks, American banks, Asian banks and European banks. They are borrowing the money wherever they can. What does that mean? That means we have to pay interest on that, like every Canadian has to on their mortgage, their car or any loan they have. Canadians pay interest for this. Interest payments are projected this year to be more than the amount of money we spend on health care. I think if we knock on the door of any Canadian family and ask them what is more important to them, paying interest or having better health care, we would get a 100% response that it should be health care. Instead, we see the opposite here. The Liberals keep borrowing, ballooning that interest line item in the budget to about $80 billion in five years. Here is what $80 billion a year can do for Canadians. With $80 billion, we can twin the TransCanada mountain pipeline. With $80 billion a year, we can build 47 hospitals the size of the very beautiful new Cortellucci Vaughan Hospital in the heart of Vaughan, in the York region where I live. With $80 billion, we can buy 800 F-35 fighter airplanes. Eighty billion dollars is more money than all the money transferred as part of the Canada health transfer. At that time, $80 billion will be about $30 billion more than we are putting into health care. We could cut the GST to zero if we had that $80 billion. Every Canadian would benefit, but no, we are putting it in interest. The economist, banking Prime Minister may have a good education from good academic institutions from around the world, but what he does not have is practical experience. The guidance he has given, which he learned from his predecessor and mentor Justin Trudeau, to the finance minister is to continue more of the same. Let us put Canada more and more in debt. In fact, they are trying these fun, fancy words now, such as the sovereign wealth fund, which of course we know is a debt fund. They could have a wealth fund, but they would have to have money for it. They do not have money when they are coming to Parliament and saying they are losing $67 billion this year. They certainly do not have money when they are saying they are going to be paying $80 billion in interest within five years, or that they are going to add more debt to the tune of $363 billion, so he comes up with this fancy thing. The other thing they are saying over there is that they spend less so they can invest more. How are they spending less? They are not spending less. They are spending more. In fact, the highest the Government of Canada has ever spent in the history of the country since Confederation is in this year’s budget. Where they are spending, there is no transparency. We should not expect transparency from these Liberals. If we had transparency, we would know who had the green slush fund money. If we had transparency, we would not have the finance minister saying he is recusing himself from talking about Alto, the $90‑billion fiasco, because his wife is a senior vice-president in the firm. He said he was part of the decision, but now he is recusing himself because the world has found out that he has a vested interest in this from a family perspective. The bottom line is that Canadians are concerned about affordability, their grocery bill, their mortgage payment, their business and employment. The government is entirely tone-deaf to what Canada wants.”

“The Liberals have failed to help Canadians and ran deficits for 11 years. They should step aside and let Conservatives run the country.”

“Mr. Speaker, the parliamentary secretary would have some credibility if he had not been saying the exact words from his seat in the House of Commons for the last 11 years. Liberals have had 11 years to get this right. For 11 years, he defended Justin Trudeau and now he is defending the current Prime Minister. For 11 years, we saw deficit after deficit. For 11 years, they have not delivered for Canadians. He is right about one thing, and that is that we say to get out of the way. We actually mean that they should get out of the way. They should listen to what we are saying and let the Conservatives run this country. Then we would see a big difference, because Canadians would be the beneficiaries of that, not their elite friends.”

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“Young people will have to pay $406.6 billion just in interest on government debt over the next six years. How can the member support what this government is doing to them?”

“Mr. Speaker, my colleague has expressed our concerns on this side of the floor. I think of 18-year-olds right now facing their futures. Over the next six years, they will be going to school, getting a trade, occupation or profession, and they will be in the seat of dealing with $406.6 billion in interest over those six years added on to increasing debt. How does the member feel about the reality of what the government is doing to the next generation of Canadians?”

“The budget fails young Canadians. They cannot find jobs, afford homes, or stay in their home communities. Life is too expensive, and many are now looking to leave the country.”

“Mr. Speaker, that is a very important question, because we are talking about the future generation, our youth in this country. When we look at the budget, we are planning for the future and the youth are the future leaders of this country. Unfortunately, hope has been taken away from them. They cannot find jobs or buy a house. When they get married and start their families, they cannot live in the community in which they grew up because things are so expensive. When I said “tone-deaf”, I mean that. I wish the parliamentary secretary, the Prime Minister and the Liberal government would knock on Canadians’ doors and find out what these young people are feeling. They are feeling despair and that the future is not bright for them. They are looking for opportunities outside our country, which would be a travesty.”

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