“The Prime Minister promised to stick to a spending limit, and he broke that promise in less than a year. The government took in more money, but it chose to spend even more. Soon, 14 cents of every dollar the government collects will go toward paying interest on the debt, leaving less for public services and tax relief. The Prime Minister needs to answer to Canadians for breaking his word.”

“Mr. Speaker, I rise today on behalf of the constituents and residents of Simcoe North to talk about some important issues facing the economy and the importance of promises. What is a promise if one has no intention of keeping their word? When a politician makes a promise, some people immediately think the politician has no intention of keeping their word. I think many politicians make promises they intend to keep. Should we not hold politicians accountable for the promises they make to Canadians, and for promises on subjects that go directly to the underlying credibility of the politician? What do I mean? The Prime Minister was elected, I think in part, on a record or a résumé that many Canadians felt was credible, especially in the areas of budgetary economics or fiscal discipline. The Prime Minister introduced a new fiscal anchor, which is really a fancy term for a fiscal target. It has only been one year since that target has been in place, and the Parliamentary Budget Officer recently indicated that the Prime Minister will blow through his own self-imposed fiscal target. I mean, this is barely a year since that target has been in place, and the Prime Minister has chosen, and I say “chosen” because it is a deliberate choice, to blow through the anchor. The Parliamentary Budget Officer also indicates that revenues are up and that if the government had not increased its spending, it could have met its own fiscal anchor or fiscal target. This is a deliberate choice by the Prime Minister to break a promise that he made to Canadians less than one year ago. Paul Martin, when he was finance minister, met every single deficit reduction target that was imposed. He met every single fiscal anchor that was imposed. There has not been a Liberal finance minister in 10 years who has met their own self-imposed fiscal targets. At the very first opportunity that the new Prime Minister and the new finance minister had to keep their fiscal promise to Canadians, they chose to break it. How is it possible that the fiscal genius who is the Prime Minister, as some people will say, is breaking a fiscal promise? He is supposed to be the one who was fiscally restrained and cared about the finances of the nation, yet he is showing himself to be about as reliable, or perhaps I should say as unreliable, as Prime Minister Trudeau in this department. This is an example of the Prime Minister undermining his own credibility on the fiscal finances of the nation by choice, less than a year after he made the promise. David Dodge, in 2023, wrote, “We have argued in the past that an interest cost/revenue ratio above 10% and a federal debt/GDP ratio that is not declining steadily from close to...where it currently stands signal risks of unsustainability.” He is talking about unsustainability of fiscal finances. I had a chance to ask Mr. Dodge, former central bank governor, about this point, and he responded: If you’re spending 10¢ out of every tax dollar that you collect on servicing past debts, that obviously leaves you with less to spend on providing current goods and services. The problem that we collectively face now and going forward is that we’re going to have growth of the economy or growth of the base revenues of government that will be equal to or perhaps even less than the interest rates. The burden of past debt will increase year after year rather than being eroded. That was in 2023. At that point in time, we were just about to approach spending 10¢ of every dollar of government revenue on interest on the debt. In just a few years, the Parliamentary Budget Officer projects, Canada will spend nearly 14¢ of every dollar it receives on interest on the debt. In fact, interest on the debt is the fastest-growing expense line item in the budget. It is growing faster than health care spending increases and faster than any other expenditure. I am asking myself how it is possible that the Prime Minister, who was elected in part because of his financial credentials, who is a two-time central banker, who is a very well-known economist, who was chair of the Financial Stability Board, who was a Goldman Sachs banker, who, to many people’s applauding, was successful as chair of Brookfield and who has fiscal credentials, is making a deliberate choice to break a promise he made to Canadians. He did not just make the promise to Canada in general. He made a promise to our young people that they would be able to inherit a government and fiscal finances that were not going to be eroded. He said he would spend less to invest more, yet we find out that the government is going to spend nearly 14¢ of every dollar paying interest on the debt. Those obligations will be passed to future generations, and they will have no choice but to meet those obligations. This means less money for social programs, less money to spend on the things Canadians want and a heck of a lot less money to provide significant tax relief to Canadians. In the face of all of this, the Prime Minister’s fiscal plan is actually to borrow record amounts of money in the bond markets. Next year, we will have to borrow almost $600 billion. The year after that, it will be $563 billion, and that is before the new borrowing we are going to see in the budget next week. The government believed interest rates were going to go down last year and into this year, but they have gone up. What is going to happen to debt service costs then? This is why the deficit target is even worse this year than it was last year. The deficit is at least $3 billion a year higher this year and every year going out. If there is continued trouble, or shocks in the bond markets, our debt service costs are going to increase substantially, and that 14¢ might become 15¢ or 16¢. Members might think I am making something up, but in the late 1970s, debt service costs were, I think, around 15¢. They then went up to 30¢. In fact, I think they peaked at 36¢. We are going in the wrong direction. This was a primary promise the Prime Minister made to the House, to Canadians and to the next generation, and he is breaking that promise. He should feel the need to answer not just to the House but to all Canadians.”

“Canada's finances are getting worse under the Prime Minister, not better. Nearly 14 cents of every tax dollar now goes just to pay interest on the national debt, up from 7.5 cents before he took office. Paying interest on the debt is the government's fastest-growing cost. The Prime Minister is putting our country at risk by borrowing record amounts of money year after year.”

“Mr. Speaker, I was unaware that the member was such a proponent of supply-side economics. The truth is that the fiscal position of this country is being eroded. It is not getting better under the Prime Minister, even though he made that commitment to Canadians, when we are going to spend nearly 14¢ out of every tax dollar brought in on interest on the debt. Interest on the debt is the fastest-growing expense of the government. We used to spend only 10¢ on the dollar, and before Prime Minister Trudeau came in, we spent only about 7.5¢ of every dollar on interest on the debt. This is going in the wrong direction, and I am quite shocked. I am surprised that the two-time central banker and much-lauded Goldman Sachs wunderkind has put Canada’s fiscal health at risk by borrowing record amounts of money year after year and continuing to stay on this course.”

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“I want the Prime Minister to come to the finance committee to answer questions. He broke his fiscal promise and ran up the debt, and he does not come to question period every day. He should want to answer for his choices.”

“Mr. Speaker, I have shared many good conversations about economics with my colleague. I find him to be incredibly smart, and his question is quite correct. The Prime Minister does not need to show up to question period every day, and he does not, which is maybe why we are asking that he might show up to a committee to answer some questions about this. While I have a lot of respect for the finance minister, and I hold him in very high regard as a parliamentarian, this fiscal promise to Canadians was not the finance minister’s promise. This was the Prime Minister’s promise. It is the Prime Minister’s choice to blow through the fiscal anchor. It is the Prime Minister’s choice to put our debt on a bad track. Frankly, the Prime Minister should want to answer questions.”

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“I want the member to explain how past Liberal governments balanced their budgets. They did it by pushing costs onto the provinces. What will happen to our social programs now that today's Liberals are putting us in the same financial trouble?”

“Mr. Speaker, my colleague channelled Paul Martin in his speech, and so I would ask him how exactly the Liberal government of that era got back to fiscal responsibility when it came to downloading responsibilities and costs to the provinces. Conservatives have been talking about what is going to happen with our social programs. What happened with social programs when the Liberals of the past were in the same situation that the Liberals of today are going to be putting us in?”

“The last time a Liberal government had to cut spending to satisfy bond markets, it hurt social services across Canada. Bond markets are unhappy again now, and our country's finances could face the same pressure.”

“Mr. Speaker, it was devastating for social services delivery across the country when the Liberal government started downloading additional responsibilities, because it had to drastically cut its spending to make the bond markets happy. The bond markets are not happy right now, and we might see continued pressure on our fiscal finances as a result.”

“The Liberal government is spending recklessly, and it is driving up the cost of living. Federal debt interest now costs more than our health care transfers. Higher interest rates mean families renewing mortgages will pay thousands of dollars more each year. Despite record spending, our economy is not growing. I want the government to cut spending in the next budget so Canadians can afford to live.”

“Mr. Speaker, it is an honour and a privilege to be here today. I will be splitting my time, to acknowledge that at the front end. We have been asked to speak today on an opposition day motion, but it is so much more than that. This is about where Canada is right now in the world. We have a government that continues to spend recklessly, which is driving up the cost of living for all Canadians. We have a Parliamentary Budget Officer who has been using certain terms for over a year: stupefying, not hitting financial targets, mesmerizing, and additional costs that are driving up costs for Canadians. We now know that the Liberal government is set to spend more on interest than it is on health care transfers. We know that the share of interest for a family is about $6,000. That is money going to bondholders and bankers across this country. We also know that the Prime Minister, in an election that occurred a year and a half ago or so, promised that he would have a declining deficit-to-GDP ratio. We will talk more about the deficit-to-GDP ratio too, because that in itself is a way to avoid accountability. Let us talk about the impact this is having on Canadians. We can see that inflation is starting to creep up. It is now up to 2.8%, and it continues to grow. In fact, all of the experts are now ringing warning bells and telling everyone. From markets to the Parliamentary Budget Officer, they are all predicting that the rate of inflation will increase and interest rates will also increase. Even Tiff Macklem is indicating that he will increase interest rates. That means that if someone is renewing a mortgage in the next three to six months, a $250,000 mortgage at standard rates for a five-year term, they could see an annual increase somewhere in the neighbourhood of $3,000 to $5,000. I would ask all members in this House which families have an extra $3,000 to $5,000 to spend. Just to do some simple arithmetic, if it were not for the Liberal government, we would not have an interest cost for the federal government of $6,000. We would not have an increase in the cost of mortgages, which is now up to $3,000 to $5,000. That is thousands of dollars. Here is a simple thought exercise. Let us think about what could be done with that money if it were not going to interest. It is money that could go to health care. It is money that could go directly to Canadians to be used for their children to play hockey. It could be used for Canadian kids to do the extracurricular activities they desire. It could be used for families to feed themselves at the end of the month, so they would not have to scrimp, save and put their grocery bill on their credit card. Let us talk a bit about the fiscal anchor. The promise the Prime Minister made is not something the Conservatives or the leader of the official opposition made up. It was from the Prime Minister. Most of the world, nearly all of it in fact, judges debt by something called the debt-to-GDP ratio. Our debt is a big, scary monster. In fact, it is $1.4 trillion. Instead of linking his promise to that, because he must have already known, this Goldman Sachs wonder kid, that he would not be able to reduce the debt-to-GDP ratio, he chose a different number. It sounds a bit like debt to GDP but is entirely different. He chose deficit to GDP. Instead of the cumulative debt, it is the amount the government is spending over what it is earning each year, which is eminently more in the control of the government of the day. He said that we were going to have a declining deficit-to-GDP number, but he cannot achieve that. The Parliamentary Budget Officer said that the government is going to miss it for the next two years. When it comes to promises from governments beyond two years, I do not put a lot of stock in them, because two years is a long way out for the Liberal government. For the foreseeable future, the government will not hit that mark. Some on the progressive left will say the problem is that we need more taxes and revenue, but the government is raking in record revenue. Is it because our economy is growing and doing great? No, not at all. It is because the government’s inflation is driving up the cost of everything, suffocating our ability to live. It also drives up government revenue. That, combined with high oil prices, means the government is taking in more money than ever, yet somehow this banker has been able to outspend our record revenue. Let us talk about a few more stats. As I said, Canadians are going to the grocery store and are realizing that a dollar does not go very far. It is $50 to fill up one bag of groceries. The $100 that used to pay for groceries for a week now lasts but a day or two. It is because of two issues. One we have talked about: inflation and higher interest. The other side of the ledger is income. Generally, when a government has an expansive fiscal policy, we get higher income. It makes sense. If we are lowering taxes and spending more, according to Keynesian economics we should get economic growth. However, the government has managed to spend more and not get economic growth. It almost defies reason that it was able to do this. Only the Liberal government could spend billions and still have our GDP per capita, which is analogous in many ways to our income per capita, stay flat over the last 11 years. If we do a comparison, our gross debt is about 110% and the U.S.’s is, to be frank, about 125%, which sounds a bit better. The U.S. has the reserve currency, which puts it in a stronger position compared to our country, as the Canadian dollar is not the reserve currency. The other thing that the U.S. and some other countries have going for them is economic growth. At the same time, we have had practically zero economic growth, GDP per capita, over the last decade. America’s economic growth has averaged well in excess of 2% to 3%, in some years even touching 4%. We can imagine our personal finances. If someone has a large mortgage, even if they have some credit card debt, and has a high income that is consistently increasing, that problem is fixable. The challenge for the Canadian economy, because of the Liberal government’s poor economic and fiscal management, is that we have high debt and low, flat incomes. Our GDP per capita would put us at the very bottom of any U.S. state’s. These are significant economic challenges that have real economic consequences. When we talk about bond yields, interest rates, inflation and other metrics, the reality for the people of Northumberland—Clarke is that they are suffering. Over the summer, I spent numerous days going to various food banks across my riding. Every single one of them has had a massive increase since 2015. I really hope the Liberals do some soul-searching. They can pick data points and numbers and we can argue about them, but what they cannot argue about is the people in Northumberland—Clarke who are suffering right now. Just one of those food banks, if I can share a number, has seen a 3,000% increase since 2015. There is a wide cross-section. It has seen a dramatic increase in children, for example, who have to use the food bank. It has seen seniors having to use the food bank. It has seen people who are employed having to use the food bank because of the Liberals’ reckless spending, which has driven the cost of living out of control. The government really needs to do some soul-searching and think about the ways it can reduce costs. I hope it does that in the next budget. I do not think it will, but Canadians desperately need the government to get spending under control so that Canadians can afford to live.”

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“Canadians spend their own money better than the government does. If the government spent less, parents could feed their children, businesses would do well, and people would have jobs. The government caused these problems itself.”

“Mr. Speaker, this comes down to a decades-old, if not centuries-old, debate. Conservatives believe at heart that the best people to spend Canadians’ money are Canadians. We do not believe we need the government to control our lives. Ronald Reagan once famously said that Liberals define compassion by how many people the government helps; Conservatives define compassion by how many people the government does not have to help. If we simply restrained spending, parents would be able to feed their children, businesses would be able to thrive and people would have jobs. These are all self-inflicted wounds by the government.”

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“The Prime Minister wants Canadians to trust his economic plan without explaining it. The government has borrowed money non-stop for 11 years and will not admit that this is wrong. I want the member to say more about this.”

“Mr. Speaker, the Prime Minister is telling Canadians to just trust him. He wants Canadians to buy fish in the ocean without even seeing them. I think it would be responsible for the Prime Minister to explain that to Canadians, since he is a fantastic economist, and make them understand what he is trying to do. The government has been borrowing money for the last 11 years non-stop. How long is it going to take the government to realize that what it has been doing is wrong? I would like the hon. member to elaborate on that.”

“The Prime Minister made these economic plans, not the member who is speaking for him. The plan is failing. I want the Prime Minister to come to committee to explain it.”

“Mr. Speaker, I always at least enjoy the passion brought by the member for Winnipeg North, but he is not the one who came up with some of these economic plans. That was the Prime Minister. In fact, I am so old that I can remember two years ago when the member was arguing for the exact opposite of what the Prime Minister is now saying. Let us bring the Prime Minister before committee and have him explain why his plan is failing.”

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“The Liberals only call us far-right when they are losing the debate. The economy is struggling, and their policies are forcing more children to use food banks. I invite the member to visit the food banks in my riding to see it for himself.”

“Mr. Speaker, the Liberals have a tell. Whenever they are losing, they use the phrase “far right”, so we know we are winning on this debate. I could give members the numbers: the flat GDP per capita, the ever-increasing deficit, the debt at $1.4 trillion and the increase in interest rates. I could go through all that, but I invite the member to come down to Northumberland—Clarke and go with me to the food banks. They will all explain to him the dramatic increase in the use of food banks by children. That is because of his policies, and I—”

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“The Liberals are not using our ideas. Conservatives would put Canadians back in control of their lives and put money back in their pockets, instead of giving it to government insiders.”

“Mr. Speaker, I have heard perhaps the best compliment I have ever heard given to the member for Winnipeg North and the Liberal government. Although I have heard that before, I do not think it is a reality. Here is the difference. Here is what Conservatives would do. Conservatives would put Canadians back in control of their lives. They would put dollars back in Canadians’ pockets, not give them to Liberal government insiders.”

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