“The Prime Minister caused a recession and avoids answering questions about it. Where is he?”

“Mr. Speaker, when the Prime Minister was asked about the recession he created, he ran away like a scared jackrabbit. Can the member tell me where the Prime Minister is?”

“Canada is the only G7 country in a recession, and the Prime Minister refuses to give a straight answer about it. His policies on taxes, spending, and red tape caused this crisis. We need to fix the economy by cutting taxes and lowering government spending.”

“Mr. Speaker, on Friday morning, we learned that Canada is the only G7 country in a recession. This is the topic the member for Edmonton West will address, as I will be sharing my time with him. As he will explain, we are the only G7 country in a recession. For the past five days, we have been waiting for a response from the Prime Minister, a man who has portrayed himself as a brilliant economist and crisis manager. For five days, we have been in crisis due to the revelation that our economy is the only one in decline, for two consecutive quarters. We are the only country in North America that is in a recession. What does the Prime Minister have to say about this? First, he said nothing. It took four days before he spoke to reporters. Last night, he approached a reporter. He thought she might ask him a nice question, perhaps give him a compliment. He was very happy. When she got to the microphone, the reporter asked him a question about the recession. Suddenly, he was unable to speak. He turned around and dodged the question. That is quite a response from a great economist. This morning, we asked him the question: Is Canada in a recession? He did not answer, other than to say that the economy is weak. Yes, it is weak. It is not the biggest and fastest-growing economy in the G7, as he had promised. It is a weak economy. Then he started making up excuses. Today, we are going to deal with the excuses that the Prime Minister is coming up with to justify having the only recession in the G7. Today, he says it is purely accidental and that if we take a closer look at the data, we will see that the investment component of GDP is up. Let us look at the report that Statistics Canada released on May 29, 2026. What does it say about investment? Allow me to quote a line from that report: Business capital investment fell 0.7% in the first quarter of 2026, the fifth consecutive quarterly decline. Investment has been down for five straight quarters. One of the causes of this recession is the dearth of investment. Based on the numbers since this Prime Minister took office, there has been a net decline of $20 billion in investment. In fact, we have the worst investment numbers in the G7, and we can see that the only economic aspects that went up last quarter are government spending and consumption, not investment. The Liberals’ second excuse is that this is just a technical recession. There is no such thing as a technical recession. Two consecutive quarters of negative growth is, by definition, a recession. The Liberals and their friends say we cannot just look at a single data point, so, okay, let us look at more data points. In the first three months of this year, 112,000 jobs were lost. The net number of jobs lost since the Prime Minister took office a year ago is 45,000. Canada’s unemployment rate is the second-highest in the G7. It is one-third higher than in the United States. The economy contracted in three of the last four quarters since the Prime Minister came to power. Our economy has bled more than $20 billion in net investment. A total of $109 billion drained out of the Canadian economy, and only $89 billion flowed in. Most of that foreign investment has been used by foreign corporations to take control of Canadian businesses. There has been no real, material investment. Canada has by far the highest level of household debt in the G7. This may be why Equifax reported that the number of insolvency cases had reached levels not seen since 2019, with a 19% increase over the previous year. In fact, 1.5 million Canadians missed a minimum payment on their debts. The mortgage delinquency rate rose by 32% compared to the previous year. When we look at the numbers in Canada, it is clear that we are in a recession because of the Liberal policies that have been imposed. No, they cannot use the usual excuse of tariffs or global factors. Every other country in the world is facing these challenges, but no other G7 country except Canada is in a recession. Mexico is part of North America and shares a border with the United States, but it is not in a recession. Canada is the only one in a recession. That is why we need to reverse the Liberal policies that caused the recession. The recession was caused by taxes, anti-development laws, government red tape and the doubling of the deficit. We, the Conservatives, are proposing to cut taxes on labour, energy, investment and housing construction. To reduce the cost and size of government, we are proposing to cut red tape, consultants, business support, foreign aid, handouts for bogus refugees and so on. The free enterprise system will enable us to grow our economy and cut costs. That is a real solution and that is what we are proposing today. I rise today to address the news from Friday that Canada is the only G7 country in a recession. Five days have gone by, and the Prime Minister has not bothered to answer a single question in the House of Commons addressing this terrible news. He said he was a man with a plan, a guy who could handle a crisis, and yet for four days, he would not even take media questions on the fact that Canada was the only G7 country in a recession. Yesterday, while walking out from a speech, a journalist called him over. He had a big smile on his face, expecting that the media was going to again throw rose petals at him. When he arrived and found that the question was about the recession, he said oh, ah, and he turned around and walked away, that being his first response after four days of learning that Canada is in a recession, the only country in the G7 in a recession. Today, he finally took a few questions from the media but refused to answer whether we were in a recession. He did make a number of excuses. He claimed that it was just that some aspects of GDP shrunk. In reality, he said, investment, is up. What does Statistics Canada say about that? The report that broke the news of the recession said, “Business capital investment fell 0.7% in the first quarter of 2026, the fifth consecutive quarterly decline.” It is not true, Mr. Prime Minister, that investment is up. In fact, the only things that were up were government spending and consumption, meaning that Canadians had to spend more just to survive. The things one would want to be up, like the net exports, were down. We have a trade deficit. Investment was also down. He went on to claim that, in fact, it was just a technical recession. In what sense is it technical? The textbook definition of a recession is two back-to-back quarters of negative growth. That definition is met. Liberals then say, as the Prime Minister said today, that we cannot focus just on one thing. I agree. Let us focus on the other data points. In the first three months of the year, 112,000 jobs were lost. Since the Prime Minister took office, on a net basis, there are 45,000 more Canadians unemployed. We have the second-highest unemployment in the G7, a third higher than in the United States. Of the last four quarters under the Prime Minister, the economy has shrunk in three of them. Business investment is down 0.7%. Over $20 billion of net investment has fled since he took office. Equifax reported that insolvency rates have increased to levels not seen since 2009, up 19% year over year, and 1.5 million Canadians have missed a debt payment in the first three months of this year alone, with mortgage delinquency rates up 32% year over year. Canada has the biggest household debt load of any country in the G7. The CEO of the Daily Bread Food Bank in Toronto said that one-tenth of Toronto is now eating at a food bank. That is the real cost. This is not technical. Hunger in the bellies of Canadians who cannot pay their bills is not technical. Canadians need a reversal in the Liberal policies, and that is what we are fighting for today. Let us have a strong, affordable and safe Canada.”

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  “Canada is the only G20 country in a recession.”

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“I have good things to say about Canadian people, who are tough enough to handle this government's bad policies. But our economy is not leading. Under the Liberals, we have the highest household debt, the most expensive homes, and the fastest-rising food prices in the G7. We are also the first to enter a recession.”

“Mr. Speaker, the member asked two questions. Do I have anything positive to say about Canada? I have plenty of positive things to say about Canada, particularly the resilience of the Canadian people who, because of their hardiness, are able to endure the punishment that the Liberal government continues to mete out. Do I have anything to say about the growth that the government claims the economy is going to lead on? I cannot say anything about that because the government and the economy it leads are not leading the G7 in any metric, other than the most household debt, the most expensive housing and the fastest-increasing food costs. In all of those areas, the economy is leading under the Liberal government and, of course, the first economy to go into a recession. That is not the type of leadership we want for our economy.”

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“The Liberals use our ideas in their speeches, but they do not actually use them in real life. Over the last 10 years, they have doubled the national debt, spent too much money, grown the government, and blocked natural resource projects. I want them to actually put our ideas into action.”

“Mr. Speaker, I would love to say that the Liberals have stolen our ideas. They have done so in words, but not in action. They have not put those ideas into practice. Over the Liberals’ 10 years in government, they have increased the cost of government, doubled the national debt, expanded the bureaucracy and public spending, and blocked the development of our natural resources. In the last election, they promised to turn things around, but nothing has happened. It was nothing more than an illusion. The Liberal Prime Minister has kept all the anti-development laws in place. He has doubled Justin Trudeau’s deficit. He has increased the cost of the bureaucracy. The government now accounts for a larger share of the economy than at any time in the past 30 years. All the anti-development taxes are still in place. I wish the Liberals would actually implement the ideas they steal from us, not just pay lip service to them.”

“Canada is in a recession and poverty is getting worse. A new report gave the country failing grades for jobs and food security, and a quarter of Canadians cannot afford enough food. I want my leader to explain how Conservative plans will fix the economy.”

“Mr. Speaker, on Friday, it was announced Canada had entered a recession and it is no coincidence that shortly thereafter, Food Banks Canada brought out its poverty report. Perhaps Liberals will not believe what we are saying about their reckless policies that are harming Canadians. The Food Bank report gave Canada an overall grade of a D+, an F for employment rate and an F for food security. Right now, one in four or 25% of Canadians are food-insecure. Can the leader talk about Conservative policies that will bring back a Canada that will work for all Canadians?”

“Canadians cannot afford food because of this government. A quarter of Canadians do not have enough to eat, and food banks are running out. I want the Prime Minister to come here and answer questions about it.”

“Yes, Mr. Speaker, this is the human cost of the Liberal recession. Canadians cannot afford to eat. In fact, yesterday’s report demonstrated that about 25% of Canadians are food-insecure and 25% of food banks at some point last year actually ran out of food. Imagine being that single mother at the checkout, her bank account empties and when she tries to pay with her debit card, it is rejected. She looks at the lineup of people who all just saw her get rejected. She gets into her car humiliated, makes her way to the food bank and it is empty. What does she do now? Liberals say that this is just a technical recession. I ask them to look that mother in the eye and say that her children’s hunger is technical. There is nothing technical about it. There are real human costs for the Liberal government’s failures, and if the Prime Minister cared at all about those costs and the people paying them, he would come into the House of Commons and answer a question about it, for once.”

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“The economy is shrinking under this government, and many working Canadians cannot afford food. The government is spending and borrowing too much money. We need to cut rules and red tape, end the industrial carbon tax, and cancel laws that block oil pipelines and oil tankers.”

“Mr. Speaker, I am very pleased to rise today on our motion. Food Banks Canada had a stark warning, and this is a stark quote from its most recent report: “Something fundamental has shifted in Canada.” It goes on to further say that, in Canada, “a job is no longer enough to ensure a reliable pathway to stability.” One in four Canadians is facing food insecurity, and 20% of the 2.2 million lining up every month at food banks are employed. I am going to read again that line from the report: in Canada, “a job is no longer enough to ensure a reliable pathway to stability.” That is what over a decade of the Liberal government has inflicted upon Canada. Something has fundamentally changed in this country, and it has fundamentally changed for the worse because of the government. In Edmonton alone, we have two separate food banks just serving veterans. Those who have served our country in the military, but also RCMP, have two separate food banks to serve them, just for them to get by. At the same time, we have the Prime Minister spending close to $200,000 for gourmet meals on his jet just for three trips, while the Liberals are spending $200 million for Liberal insiders for a concrete pad, a cement pad, in Nova Scotia. Canada has entered recession territory. The Liberals will quibble and say that it is only a technical recession and really does not count, but the economy is shrinking: not just the last two quarters, but three of the last four quarters. We are the only G7 country with a shrinking economy. In fact, even basket cases like France and Italy do not have shrinking economies. We are in fact the only economy that has shrunk in the last four quarters in the G7. No one else has: not the U.S., not Germany, which continues on its path to net-zero economic suicide, and not Italy, without all the oil resources we have, but just us. Again, think of the old world, the G7, and all the issues they are having with the Ukraine war and being cut off from their natural gas resources, and yet somehow they have avoided a recession like ours. This GDP issue reflects our stagnating standard of living and anemic productivity growth and highlights our weakness in business investments. According to the Fraser Institute, investment in plants, machinery equipment and IP has fallen 20% as a share of the economy in the last 10 years. I wonder what happened 10 years ago that would cause us to be on such a decline. Further, the last four years have seen this decline accelerate, matching about four years ago when the current Prime Minister started helping the government as a special economic adviser. What a coincidence, I know. More sobering news is from the Bank of Canada monetary policy report. The member for Winnipeg North just previously was saying that the Liberals believe in the Bank of Canada and that the Bank of Canada has all the information, and he asked if we did not believe in the Bank of Canada. Well, I believe in the Bank of Canada monetary policy report, which actually shows that the government is misleading Canadians on growth. The Bank of Canada is predicting, next year, a 16% lower GDP growth than the government just did in its spring budget. The year after that, it is predicting a 13% lower growth. I ask the member for Winnipeg North whom he believes. Does he believe the Bank of Canada, as he just stated he does, or does he not now, when it is not convenient for him? Even the Bank of Canada does not believe the government when it says that we are the fastest-growing economy in the G7. We are not. Further, which is even more sobering, for 2026, of the anemic growth that we have under the Liberal government, the Bank of Canada is saying 75% is from added government spending. It is not from exporting oil, perhaps, and not from IP or investment, but from government spending. In 2027, 44% of the growth in the forecast is government spending. The year after, 25% of all the growth that the Bank of Canada is seeing in GDP is coming from government spending. This is not a way to grow out of the troubles we are in, by just simply borrowing more money and spending more money. Over the next five years, we are going to have almost $400 billion just in interest payments. What are we getting for it? We are not getting growth, like the one we see in the other countries. We are seeing a shrinking economy. What do we do about this? Well, apart from joining Marty McFly and Doc Brown, getting into a DeLorean and going back to 2015 to ensure that Trudeau does not get elected, we can change the policies now. We can start undoing the Liberal policies that are wrecking the economy. The Chamber of Commerce, just recently in a submission to the finance committee, said that the government needs to focus on competitiveness, and that we cannot compete globally because of a regulatory and red tape regime that is seen as cumbersome and anti-investment. We have well over 300,000 different rules and regulations, over 450 different acts, sometimes with thousands of regulations per act that are tying up and slowing our economic growth. What does the government do? Well, normal governments around the world would perhaps say, “Well, let us reduce red tape. Let us cut some of the red tape.” We know defence procurement is a mess, but instead of actually addressing it, the government created another bureaucracy to work around its own rules that it created. For major projects, it is same thing, adding more bureaucracy to work around the other bureaucracy it created. Further, the government created another bureaucracy for red tape reduction, and 34 full-time equivalents were added to the bureaucracy to cut red tape. We submitted an Order Paper question asking what the government managed to cut for regulations. With 34 full-time employees, we ended up with 29 regulations repealed. Here are some of them. They repealed UN regulations regarding Sierra Leone. Wow, that is going to grow the economy. They cut regulations on corded window covering products. They cut regulations regarding board elections for the Wheat Board, years after the Wheat Board went away. This is what 34 full-time employees managed to do over a period of a couple of years to cut red tape. They changed regulations on the Wheat Board elections for the board of directors of a Wheat Board that does not exist anymore. How are we going to grow the economy if this is the best the government can do? We could get our energy products to market. We could build pipelines. We could get rid of the oil and gas emissions cap. The government will say that we do not have that anymore, but it has not come out and said that the cap is dead. We could get rid of the anti-Alberta tanker ban, Bill C-48. We have a private member’s bill before this House right now to eliminate the tanker ban, and Liberals are opposing it. It is perfectly fine to have Saudi Arabia oil come up the St. Lawrence, but we cannot have Alberta oil off the north B.C. coast. We could get rid of the costly industrial carbon tax and the unconstitutional “no new pipelines” bill, Bill C-69. If we want northern gateway to get built, which could add tens of billions of dollars of added growth to the economy, the government needs to get out of the way. It needs to kill Bill C-48, the anti-Alberta tanker ban. It needs to kill Bill C-69. It needs to get rid of the oil and gas emissions cap. We need to get rid of the government’s determination to wreck our economy.”

“The Liberal government has failed Canadians over the last ten years. It has caused higher unemployment, record debt, and record food bank use, including two food banks just for veterans in Edmonton.”

“Mr. Speaker, I would like to thank my colleague from Winnipeg North for fiction hour in the House of Commons. What has the government delivered in over 10 years? It is not a new government. It is the same old, tired Liberal government. It has delivered rising unemployment, record debt, record deficit and record Canadians at food banks. The government has delivered an economy that requires us to have two food banks just to serve veterans in Edmonton. That is what this 10-year-old tired, corrupt Liberal government has delivered for Canadians.”

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“The Prime Minister promised twice to get a deal done by last summer, but he failed. We need to make this deal for the people of Quebec.”

“Mr. Speaker, my colleague brought up a lot of great points. The Prime Minister twice promised to get a deal done by last summer. Twice, he has not delivered. The best thing we can do for my colleagues from Quebec and their constituents is deliver a deal. The government has failed to do so, despite repeated promises by the Prime Minister.”

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“The government says Canada's economy is growing, but it is doing poorly. Inflation, unemployment, and food bank use are all up, while business investment has dropped for five quarters in a row. I want to ask my colleague how we can fix this.”

“Mr. Speaker, the Liberals keep saying that there is so much growth in Canada, so let us take a look at the growth that I am seeing. I am seeing growth in inflation, which was up 0.5% in April, and growth in unemployment in April. Food bank usage is up massively. We are also seeing that business capital investment fell 0.7% in the first quarter of 2026, which was the fifth consecutive quarter in which business capital investment in Canada dropped. I am wondering what my colleague thinks about that and if he has any ideas about how to get the government back in line.”