Mr. Speaker, I am honoured to speak today on Bill C-14, which, among other things, increases the ceiling for the government's borrowing authority from $1.1 trillion to $1.8 trillion. This would enable the government to drive the country an additional $700 billion into debt.
Even prior to the pandemic, the government's finances were already like a ship lost at sea with no fiscal anchors. For context, between 1867 and 2020, the accumulated federal debt was just over $700 billion. Over the past year, it has exceeded $1.1 trillion, or 50% over our accumulated debt since Confederation. This is a staggering number never seen before.
Canadians desperately need the government to have a plan to get Canada’s fiscal house back in order when the COVID crisis subsides. It goes without saying that the government would have been in a far stronger position to weather this storm if it simply had not broken its promise in 2015 to balance the budget by 2019.
With respect to interest rates, I recall vividly a time when interest rates were very high. In fact, my first home mortgage in 1989 had an interest rate of 12.75%. That was a good rate at the time. The former governor of the Bank Canada and the Parliamentary Budget Officer both confirmed in finance committee testimony that interest rates will inevitably go up. Interest rate increases are an existential threat to the federal government’s ability to fund programs, like the COVID programs and others, into the future.
If interest rates go up by even one percentage point, that will cost $11 billion; a 5% interest rate rise would cost $55 billion. I say to the Minister of Finance, please heed these warnings. We must be ready. We do not want to be in the same position as Paul Martin and Jean Chrétien were in the mid-90s, when they had to slash health care transfers.
Our economy cannot recover without small businesses being successful, and right now across the country they are hurting, including in my home province of Manitoba. According to the CFIB, 2.4 million jobs are at risk nationally and 181,000 businesses are at risk of closing their doors forever. In Manitoba it estimates that there are an estimated 5,601 businesses at risk, which represents over 102,000 jobs in Manitoba out of a population of 1.3 million people, and 16% of Manitoba businesses are actively considering winding down or declaring bankruptcy. These job losses are from across all sectors.
While public health restrictions have been necessary to slow the spread of COVID-19, they came with a massive price. This recent data shows the devastating impacts they have had on small businesses and the families they support. If these businesses do not survive, Canada’s economic recovery will be much more difficult.
In saying this, I am not arguing against the need for extraordinary measures, but rather to highlight the desperate need for a recovery plan as soon as possible. Not only have small businesses been devastated, but so have charities. Canadian charities need to be an effective partner in any recovery plan. My bill, the supporting Canadian charities act, would give the charitable sector the boost it needs by making the proceeds of sale of private shares and real estate exempt from the capital gains tax if donated to a qualified charity within 30 days.
This common sense measure could have been in place six years ago, but the Liberals tossed it aside from the 2015 budget when they formed government. If this measure had been in place, charities would have received hundreds of millions of dollars more and would have been better positioned to respond to the pandemic and be prepared for the recovery.
With regard to vaccines, they are critical to reopening the economy. Acquiring vaccines and getting them to provinces must be the federal government’s top priority. Only 1.46% of Canadians have been vaccinated. In contrast, Israel has vaccinated 22.34% of its citizens; the UAE is at 14.1%; and the U.K. is at 4.19%. Canada ranks at least a distant number 11 in the world for per capita vaccinations. The government has put Canadians at the back of pack with their mismanagement of the rollout.
Canada will receive zero doses of the Pfizer vaccine this week. How can provinces come up with vaccination plans without certainty of delivery? Why did the Prime Minister wait until last week to even pick up the phone and speak to the CEO of Pfizer? We cannot secure jobs, our economy, and our future without vaccines. Where is the plan?
With respect to the aviation industry, it is critical national infrastructure. This debate is not just about regional routes; it is about all routes and all jobs. It is about positioning our economy for a full and robust recovery and securing our future.
On Saturday, I spoke with Joseph. Joseph is a 31-year-old pilot. He and his partner live in my riding and have a two-year-old son, who was playing with Lego when I called. After several years of flying, he got his dream job last February flying 737s for WestJet. On May 4, he was grounded because of the pandemic. He fears he may never get back to the work he loves and just cannot make ends meet on available government assistance.
Joseph and his family and thousands of aviation workers in his situation are counting on us to get this right. The government has said that the purpose of this bill is to “provide assistance to families with young children, support students, and invest in resources to protect the health and safety of Canadians.” I cannot think of a better way to do this than to provide aviation workers, many of whom have young families, just like Joseph, with a plan to protect their livelihoods.
Since the beginning of the pandemic, travel and aviation workers have been dramatically impacted in such a negative way. With international travel being shut down and domestic travel slowing to a snail's pace, aviation workers and their livelihoods have been grounded. They were assured for months by the government that help was coming. They were assured that talks with airlines and other industry stakeholders were ongoing to develop a plan. They were told to just wait and be patient. Even after hundreds of aviation workers demonstrated on the Hill in October, pleading for help, all they have heard are crickets from the government.
With the situation in the aviation industry getting worse by the day, aviation workers and their families cannot wait any longer. Where is the plan? Where are the assurances that these jobs will not be eliminated and that travel adviser commissions will be protected? Where are the assurances for travellers to get full refunds on tickets which were cancelled due to COVID-19? Why is rapid testing not in place at airports? Pilots, flight attendants, baggage personnel, mechanics, independent travel advisers and many others are still waiting for this long-promised plan. Let us not forget it is aviation workers who continue to play crucial roles in the distribution of vaccines and PPE across the country. They are there for us, but the government is simply not there for them.
While emergency measures in this bill are worthy of consideration, what I do not support is rubber-stamping continued runaway deficits. Combining a $700 billion increase in borrowing authority with these measures into one bill is just simply bad governance. An increase of the debt limit sufficiently to allow for the government to fund the COVID emergency spending through to the end of the next fiscal year would make sense. However, anything further must be contingent on a fiscal anchor and must have parliamentary and committee scrutiny. Such a vast spending authority needs to be considered separate and apart from these important supports.
To put this in perspective, the $700 billion increase in spending authority being requested over the next three years is equivalent to the total $700 billion debt of Canada accumulated between 1867 and 2020. It is a staggering amount as I have said. The government's borrowing authority should be debated in a separate bill to ensure there is appropriate parliamentary oversight and scrutiny. We should not be providing the government carte blanche to spend as it sees fit, without end and in the absence of such oversight.
On this side of the House, the Conservatives are focused on taking actions to get as many people back to work in every part of Canada and every sector as quickly as possible. We are ready to do whatever it takes to get Canada working again, but we must ensure that taxpayer dollars are treated with respect.
As the official opposition, we are committed to ensuring the government's spending supports Canadians when they need it the most while being focused on responsible fiscal management for the years to come. We need to secure the future for all Canadians.