Juno News - December 09, 2021


Trudeau’s finance minister unable to answer questions about economy

Topics
housing market stability total debt level in Canada
Mentioned
Poliev Bergen Chair Clerk Wayne Easter Zerowitz Leswick
Communist China's growing threat to the west Identity politics and grievance culture are killing civilization

Episode Stats


Length

8 minutes

Words per minute

156.46

Word count

1,327

Sentence count

124

Harmful content

Hate speech

1

sentences flagged


Summary

Summaries generated with gmurro/bart-large-finetuned-filtered-spotify-podcast-summ .

In this episode, Finance Minister Bill Morneau answers a question from the House of Commons committee on the economy and finance. The question was, "Will Canada face a housing crash?" and the Minister's answer was cut off at point of order.

Transcript

Transcript generated with Whisper (turbo).
Hate speech classifications generated with facebook/roberta-hate-speech-dynabench-r4-target .
Topics generated with Qwen2.5-3B-Instruct.
Hosts, guests, and mentioned names generated with spaCy (en_core_web_sm), reconciled against Wikidata.
00:00:00.000 Mr. Poliev, for five minutes.
00:00:03.960 Thank you, Minister.
00:00:07.740 Will Canada face a housing crash?
00:00:13.440 I don't think that it is wise for anyone with economic responsibility
00:00:20.660 to make predictions about what's going to happen.
00:00:24.060 But what I do want to say is what is very imprudent
00:00:30.180 and actually very irresponsible is to speculate.
00:00:34.840 Point of order?
00:00:35.540 Yes?
00:00:36.060 Sorry, I just want to clarify.
00:00:37.940 Is there not a conventional agreement that the length of the answer
00:00:42.280 will be equivalent to the length of the question?
00:00:45.500 Well, we have to allow the Minister the opportunity to answer the question.
00:00:49.080 The Minister was answering the question.
00:00:50.980 Yeah.
00:00:51.120 So, I would like clarity.
00:00:54.660 Yeah, I'd like some clarity on that just so that we're all aware
00:00:57.760 of what the conventional agreement of order.
00:01:00.480 Point of order on the point of order?
00:01:02.120 There is usually not a conventional agreement.
00:01:05.380 In my years, I've been here 13 years.
00:01:08.360 There actually is a conventional understanding.
00:01:11.340 The Minister has all the right to answer the question.
00:01:15.220 Point of order?
00:01:16.560 Just to be clear on that point, there is a convention.
00:01:19.560 I can quote the great Liberal Chair, Wayne Easter, on that point, who said,
00:01:24.400 I call it, each member's allocated so much time, we will stick to six minutes for a first round
00:01:31.460 and five for a second round for questions and answers.
00:01:34.040 As for the process, if there is an eight-second question, we expect the answer to be eight seconds.
00:01:39.480 So, that is a convention.
00:01:41.520 It is practice in all committees, including Committee of the Whole yesterday.
00:01:44.940 So, witnesses are entitled to make opening speeches.
00:01:48.980 And then we move to questions.
00:01:50.620 Mr. Chair, can we ask the Clerk whether there's a convention here?
00:01:54.960 Whether you can weigh in?
00:01:55.740 Clerk? 0.97
00:01:56.020 It is to the Chair's discretion.
00:02:08.320 And so, I would say that the Minister, you have the right to answer the question.
00:02:12.940 And I do not believe a question could be asked in two seconds or three seconds,
00:02:17.660 and that will not give sufficient time to answer the question.
00:02:20.440 So, allow the Minister to answer the question.
00:02:24.960 So, is the Minister's answer that – the Minister, I guess, has given her answer.
00:02:30.580 I actually wasn't finished.
00:02:31.840 I was cut off, in fact.
00:02:33.540 All right.
00:02:33.820 So, I guess the question was whether she thinks there will be a housing crash.
00:02:39.320 Yes.
00:02:39.820 And so, let me just say.
00:02:41.760 Yes.
00:02:42.200 I think that it is really incumbent on everyone in this committee.
00:02:48.040 We're all members of Parliament.
00:02:49.760 We have a higher responsibility, which is members of the Finance Committee.
00:02:53.860 And to speculate irresponsibly and to make assertions that could damage confidence in the Canadian economy,
00:03:03.280 is highly irresponsible.
00:03:06.240 So, let me just assure Canadians that our housing market – that our banks are very, very stable.
00:03:14.620 Our government took measures last summer to further stabilize the housing market
00:03:20.740 and to ensure that Canadians were not taking undue risk.
00:03:25.660 OSFI did the same thing.
00:03:27.820 Is our housing market stable today?
00:03:29.820 As I said, I have great confidence in Canada's regulators.
00:03:38.220 I have great confidence in OSFI.
00:03:40.320 Is it stable?
00:03:40.880 I have great confidence in the prudent measures that the government and OSFI put in place last summer
00:03:48.460 to ensure Canadians did not take on undue risk.
00:03:52.560 Is it stable?
00:03:53.440 And I just want to reiterate that for anyone, particularly someone from a party that aspires one day to form government –
00:04:05.440 Is the housing market stable?
00:04:06.740 – to make such irresponsible assertions –
00:04:10.240 Point of order, Mr. Chair.
00:04:10.820 Point of order.
00:04:11.440 Point of order.
00:04:11.940 We don't –
00:04:12.260 Point of order.
00:04:13.040 Ms. Zerowitz.
00:04:13.720 Yes.
00:04:13.980 Can we please allow the Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of Finance to respond
00:04:18.020 without repeating the question over and over again?
00:04:20.960 Point of order.
00:04:21.820 Point of order, Ms. Bergen?
00:04:22.820 Chair, you've ruled that you want to give the Minister the ability to respond to answer the question.
00:04:27.500 I think the Minister is now wading into telling opposition members how to do their job.
00:04:32.340 So respectfully, I've chaired a committee before.
00:04:35.140 That's not a point of order.
00:04:36.260 It's absolutely a point of order.
00:04:37.860 Ms. Bergen, what I'll say is it is very difficult with crosstalk for the interpreters.
00:04:41.820 It is difficult.
00:04:42.340 For one, for the interpreters.
00:04:43.920 Then, you know, do your job and allocate the time accordingly and let us get on with the questioning.
00:04:49.720 And that is what is being done, Mr. Poliev.
00:04:52.100 So allow the Minister to answer and then ask your next question and allow the Minister to answer.
00:04:59.080 And then we will continue in that format.
00:05:01.280 So we're not going to get an answer on whether the Minister thinks the housing market is stable.
00:05:05.220 My next question is, what is the total amount of public and private debt in Canada today?
00:05:10.280 We are going to give a full report on Canada's public finances on Tuesday.
00:05:20.000 But I am happy to say that the net worth of Canadian households is up 22% from the beginning of the crisis.
00:05:27.120 And that in Q3, the household savings rate was 4%.
00:05:30.740 The question is the total debt of Canadians today.
00:05:31.740 Sorry, it was 11% compared to 3.4% in…
00:05:36.960 Sorry, Minister, just for the interpreters, it is very difficult, the crosstalk that happens when you interject and not allow just the finishing, at least, of a sentence.
00:05:47.940 So allow the Minister just to conclude her remarks.
00:05:51.580 The question was, what is the total debt level, public and private, in Canada today?
00:05:56.940 Just looking for that particular number.
00:05:58.860 And I am happy to say that on Tuesday, just a few days from now, we're going to give a full public accounting.
00:06:08.180 But I am pleased also to remind the member that the savings rate of Canadians was 11% in the third quarter, up from 3.4% between 2010 and 2019.
00:06:20.580 Question for Mr. Leswick.
00:06:22.180 Does he know the total debt, public and private, that exists in Canada today?
00:06:26.040 I believe that the rule is that the questions go to me here.
00:06:32.020 Is he a witness?
00:06:33.200 He is a witness.
00:06:34.220 I thought he might have the number.
00:06:39.160 Witnesses do have…
00:06:39.640 Questions can be posed to him.
00:06:40.940 Okay, Nick, go ahead if you wish.
00:06:44.080 I apologize to the member.
00:06:45.340 I don't have that number at my fingertips.
00:06:47.380 That's a pretty important number.
00:06:49.380 I'm amazed that a Minister of Finance and a senior finance official would not know how much debt there is in Canada today.
00:06:54.760 What would be the total cost for if there were a 1% average increase of interest rates on Canada's national debt per year?
00:07:05.160 Just the number.
00:07:06.780 And here, just let me say, when we publish the economic and fiscal update on Tuesday,
00:07:15.140 we will include, as we did in the budget, as we always do, downside and upside risk scenarios.
00:07:22.880 And those will include a careful accounting of the impact of higher than expected interest rates.
00:07:29.600 The question was really how much it would cost if interest rates went up even 1% on Canada's national debt.
00:07:35.000 The Minister, this is sort of a number we would expect the government to know on any given day, not to have to wait for a report.
00:07:42.040 So what would it cost for a 1% increase in interest rates on Canada's national debt?
00:07:46.740 Just the number, please.
00:07:48.020 The information that is published in the economic and fiscal update, which will be on Tuesday, is market sensitive.
00:07:56.260 We publish it all at the same time, and I have not come to this committee for an early reveal of the economic and fiscal update.
00:08:06.120 But all the numbers are there, and I do want to say, because it is important to say to Canadians that the Minister is to be allowed to answer the questions.
00:08:18.940 And once again, Mr. Poliev was not allowing the Minister to answer the question.
00:08:22.440 Just a quorum, Mr. Poliev, and your time is actually up, so we are going to be moving now to the Liberals.