Pierre Poilievre and Justin Trudeau face off over housing
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Summary
Learn English with Justin Trudeau. Prime Minister Justin Trudeau delivers a speech on the importance of providing support for Canadian families facing homelessness and access to housing, and the need for affordable housing in Canada. Speaker: "When the Prime Minister took office, a two-bedroom apartment in Canada s 10 biggest cities, on average, was $1,100. How much is it today? ...
Transcript
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The question was that he promised in 2015, and I quote,
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we will make it easier for Canadians to find an affordable place to call home.
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When he made that promise, the average monthly payment for a mortgage in Canada was a modest $1,400.
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Of course, situations vary across the country, but we have stepped up with housing programs in big cities like Vancouver, Toronto, Montreal,
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but we have also stepped up in smaller municipalities and rural areas across the country that need supports in housing.
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Unlike the previous Conservative government that did not feel the federal government had any role to play in housing,
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we stepped up in tangible, concrete ways to deliver more housing, to deliver rapid housing,
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to deliver programs that fought homelessness, programs that increase the rental stocks.
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We will continue to be investing to support people alongside our partners in the provinces and municipalities.
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He wants to compare with the Conservative record.
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I told him when the Conservatives left office, the average monthly payment on a new house was $1,400.
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Either he doesn't know or he's too afraid to admit, but it's gone up to over $3,100.
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When the Prime Minister took office, a two-bedroom apartment in Canada's 10 biggest cities, on average, was $1,100.
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Mr. Speaker, over the past eight years, we've seen significant growth in the economy.
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We've seen more Canadians getting jobs than ever before.
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We've seen more Canadians lifted out of poverty than ever before because of the things we did.
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From the very first initiative, which was lowering taxes for the middle class and raising them on the wealthiest 1%,
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to delivering a Canada child benefit that puts more money in the pockets of families that need it,
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and stops sending child benefit checks to millionaires.
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We've continued to move forward in supporting communities, supporting homebuilders, supporting homeowners and homebuyers.
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Mr. Speaker, he would have you believe that Canadians have never had it so good.
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Well, ask the 9 in 10 young people who believe they will never own a home.
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The 35-year-olds living in their parents' basements because they can't afford the new doubling of the average down payment,
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And speaking of paychecks, when he took office, the average paycheck,
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you only needed 39% of the average paycheck to make monthly payments on the average house.
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By every objective measurement, things are more expensive and Canadians are taking home less.
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Mr. Speaker, across the country, we've seen record job growth.
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We've seen record number of Canadians lifted out of poverty.
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We've seen investments to fight climate change that have put more money in people's pockets.
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We've continued to move forward in growing the economy.
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But it is only, Mr. Speaker, the Conservative leader trying to say Canadians have never had it so good
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And that's why we continue to step up with investments in dental care,
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two initiatives that the Conservatives voted against.
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We will continue to be there to deliver for Canadians while we deliver a better future for everyone.
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He's trying to talk about everything but the housing questions I asked.
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In fact, it's much more expensive than around the rest of the world.
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Vancouver is now the third most overpriced housing market.
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Worse than Manhattan, than Singapore, than London, than countless other places with more people, more money, and less land.
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In fact, the average house price last year in the United States was almost half less than it is here in Canada.
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Why is housing so much more expensive here than elsewhere in the world?
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Mr. Speaker, we have continually invested in programs and supports for Canadians
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that have seen millions of families entering new homes, getting the supports they needed,
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millions of refurbishments, millions of supports right across the country.
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But it's interesting to contrast the Conservative record on that.
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In the last election campaign, the Conservative platform promise on housing
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What we contrasted with significant investments in delivering for first-time homebuyers,
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delivering for people facing homelessness, delivering for Canadian families to access better housing.
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Why it is that mortgage payments have doubled under his eight years?
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Why rent payments have doubled under his eight years?
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Why Canadian house prices are about 72% more expensive than their American counterparts,
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even though they have 10 times the population on even less land?
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The answer, according to Scotiabank, is Canada has the lowest number of housing units
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The number of housing units per 1,000 Canadians has been falling since 2016,
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Why is the Prime Minister continually giving billions of dollars to municipal government gatekeepers
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Mr. Speaker, this goes to the heart of the disagreement on housing between the Leader of the Opposition and I.
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I recognized, and this government recognized, that we need to work with municipalities to help them change zoning laws,
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to help them accelerate their permitting processes,
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to create more opportunities to build affordable homes for Canadians across the country,
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whereas he sits back and attacks them and proposes absolutely nothing.
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We're stepping up with $4 billion to accelerate the supply of homes across this country.
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We will continue to be investing and working with partners,
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instead of picking fights with everyone and hoping that it all settles itself.
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No, actually, the disagreement is that under our government, housing was affordable,
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and under this government, it's eye-poppingly expensive.
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Canada has the fewest houses per capita of any country in the G7,
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Why? We rank 64th in the OECD in the time it takes to get a building permit.
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Government red tape adds as much as $650,000 to each house in some cities.
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And the Prime Minister has made it worse by giving the gatekeepers who blocked the building more money.
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Mr. Speaker, this goes to the heart of the announcement we made last week on the Housing Accelerator Fund,
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which does work directly with municipalities to accelerate the delivery and the construction of affordable housing.
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Now, Mr. Speaker, what the member opposite would have you believe is that doing nothing to address the housing crisis
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He criticizes us for the investments of billions of dollars in housing over the past years.
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Just think, if things are expensive now, how much worse it would have been
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had we had a Conservative government that continued to cross its arms
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and cut services to Canadians for the past eight years?
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You don't have to imagine what prices would have been were I making the decisions,
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the average mortgage payment and the average rent payment were half of what they are now.
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Now, his solution is to continue to send billions of dollars.
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He spent $89 billion on housing affordability to double mortgage payments,
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double rental costs, double the needed down payment.
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Next thing, the member opposite is going to complain that housing prices are higher today
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than they were in my father's time as Prime Minister.
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Mr. Speaker, we are going to continue to invest in Canadians
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and recognize that while we grow the economy, while we...
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I'm going to have to interrupt the Right Honourable Prime Minister.
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I'm having a hard time hearing the answer, and I'm sure other people are.
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The Right Honourable Prime Minister, you've got about 20 seconds left.
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Mr. Speaker, every step of the way, we've contributed to a growing economy,
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to putting more money in the pockets of the middle class
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And that's why we're continuing to invest in building houses,
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in working with municipalities, in working with the provinces
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on fighting homelessness, creating affordable homes,
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and creating more opportunities for all Canadians.
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You know, when you look at his promise to make it easier for Canadians to get a home,
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and since that time, the payments have actually doubled.
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You listen to him rattle off the billions he's spent to achieve that failure.
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He kind of reminds you of that shady contractor
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who promises you that he'll build you a brand new home,
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but the cost just keeps going up and up and up,
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and the house never actually gets built, Mr. Speaker.
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And that is exactly where young people are today,
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their dreams crushed because they can't get themselves a home and start a family.
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and sending billions of dollars more money to those bureaucracies,
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why won't he get them out of the way to bring homes Canadians can afford?
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Mr. Speaker, the Conservative leader is actually arguing
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less investments alongside municipalities and provinces,
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will get people to pull themselves up by their bootstraps and succeed.
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Mr. Speaker, we believe in investing in the middle class
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and that's why Canadians are doing better than they were before.
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In other words, we should forgive him for failing
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Mr. Speaker, what we propose is actually to incentivize home building.
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Why doesn't the government link the number of federal infrastructure dollars
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a big city gets to the number of houses that actually get completed?
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That would incentivize them to get the gatekeepers out of the way.
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We could bring in penalties for big city bureaucrats
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that block construction and boost infrastructure dollars
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Why won't he pay for results instead of paying for failure?
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that when the Honourable Member was in government,
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the characterization of the relationships between provinces,
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He is demonstrating that eight years of investments in Canadians,
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in growth, in lifting Canadians out of poverty,
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just makes him want to go back to the good old days of Stephen Harper
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Mr. Speaker, he says that Canadians shouldn't worry about the fact
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that our young people are living in homeless shelters
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he believes we shouldn't worry about the poverty
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Why won't the Prime Minister link federal infrastructure dollars
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for cities to the number of houses they allow to be built?
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so that we can have more affordable homes for our young people.
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The Member Officer wants to talk about poverty.
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The very first thing he did after we became government
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so we could lower them for the middle class.
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that has lifted hundreds of thousands of kids out of poverty.
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while lifting millions of Canadians out of poverty, Mr. Speaker.
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even as we stand with people going through difficult times right now.
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Well, the Prime Minister has failed to make housing affordable
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I've suggested to him we should link the number of dollars
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a big city gets to the number of houses they allow to be built
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Well, he doesn't like results, but here's another idea.
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In the most successful transit and housing jurisdictions on earth,
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Will the Prime Minister require every federally funded transit station
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For a long time, his only recommendation to help Canadians
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But now he's talking about credible opportunities to help Canadians.
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is something that we're already moving forward on
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that in order to invest in density around transit hubs,
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which we have continued to do to record levels.
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And what I'm proposing is not to dream about housing around transit,
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but to actually require every single federally funded transit station
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He's got 37,000, many of them largely empty buildings,
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so we can convert those into affordable housing
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Speaker, part of a question period, an answer period,
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Not only do we like the idea of density around public transit spaces,
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We've been putting it in our agreements with municipalities
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as we invest historic amounts in public transit.
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Now, the government, the former Conservative government,
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refuse to invest in any infrastructure larger than a doorknob
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We're continuing to invest in significant public transit,
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including with a permanent public transit fund,
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something that the Conservatives have again campaigned against.
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We will continue to be there to invest in Canadians.
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Their very first infrastructure project was to install a doorknob
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in the Prime Minister's office when they took office, Mr. Speaker.
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Mr. Speaker, he is presiding over a 37,000-building empire,
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so that we can convert those buildings into affordable housing
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so that they can actually have a roof over their head
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moving off his recommendations on buying Bitcoin
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I wish he'd paid attention to the ideas we have
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Mr. Speaker, the only ideas he's put forward on housing
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is to double the rent, double the mortgage costs,
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and this is on the backs of hard-working Canadians
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On April 1st, he wants to raise the cost of housing even more
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a monthly expense that goes with owning a home.
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This at a time when seniors are already choosing,
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making the heartbreaking decision between eating and heating.
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He wants to triple, triple, triple the carbon tax.
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Will he cancel his plan to raise taxes on our seeders,
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Mr. Speaker, as of April, the places across the country
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that have the carbon backstop in place will receive more money.
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We are delivering more money than the price on pollution costs
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because we know that people both want to see us
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fighting climate change and preparing for the economy
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while making things more affordable to Canadians.
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puts more money back in the pockets of people in his riding,
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people right across the country in backstop areas.