Canada has become significantly less affordable
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Summary
In this episode of The Blueprints, we discuss the rising cost of living, gas prices, food prices, and fertilizer tariffs with three of Canada's most experienced critics of the Liberal agenda. To talk about these issues, we have Dan Albus, Philip Lawrence, and Dan Alban.
Transcript
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welcome once again to the blueprints this is canada's conservative podcast i'm your host
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jamie schmale member of parliament for halliburton court the legs brock with another great episode
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lined up for you and because it is new content which we have for you every single tuesday 1 30
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p.m eastern time we ask that you like subscribe share this program together we can push back
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against the ever-moving liberal agenda and of course if you can't listen or watch the entire
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program right this second download it listen to it later on tell your friends about it on platforms
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like castbox itunes google play spotify you name it it is out there so our conversation today wraps
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around a conversation i think everyone is having no matter what part of the country you live in it is
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the rising cost of living to talk about that we have two amazing critics we have dan albus the
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member of parliament for central okanagan samilkami nikola is also the shadow minister for finance
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and beside him we have philip lawrence the member of parliament for north humberland peterborough south
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also the shadow minister for fed dev the federal economic development agency for ontario so welcome
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gentlemen thanks for having us so earlier this week we had a motion between before the house of
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commons and every opposition party gets a certain number of opposition motion days we can talk about
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whatever we want and it has to be voted on by the house we had a pretty important one to help
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lower the cost of living for canadians because it's just out of control dan why don't you start
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with us tell us a bit about that motion we had last week and uh what we tried to accomplish well
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thanks jamie i really appreciate the opportunity to talk to this because my constituents they're
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talking about gas prices i'm not sure about the two of you absolutely but this is the issue
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because people are seeing uh groceries have gone up 10 percent the last time we saw groceries go up
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this this quickly uh was in 1981 when uh ronald reagan was in power but also when we had another
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uh big spending uh tax and spend uh divisive liberal prime minister named trudeau so the the policies of
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this government are just making it life unaffordable so our uh leader candace bergen put forward a motion
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uh that would focus specifically on those issues so we wanted to take the gst for example off of uh
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gas at the pumps so whether it be uh gasoline or diesel uh and we also wanted to remove it on
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household electricity and heating bills these are important uh it's incredibly important for us right
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now to try to do everything we can to to help people now what the liberals are talking about they're
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saying well we'll get you a daycare program in my province was the first province to sign on to a daycare program
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they've i've heard from mlas that it's going to take years before they even get to that so this government is
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you know always great at pulling out a rabbit out of the hat so to speak or a shiny new bauble to distract people
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but conservatives are actually focused on where people are at and what i'm hearing is people want us to tackle gas prices
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and they want to keep life affordable uh there's also a real push on uh fertilizer tariffs as well as
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other products um you know specifically for farmers right now with the uh russian invasion of ukraine
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russia has strategically cut off food supplies so wheat uh that should be going to feed the world
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is not and so this government unlike any g7 country has actually put a tariff on uh farmers so that when
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they bring in fertilizer that's already been ordered already been paid for usually you put a tariff on
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something to stop the consumption of something so this this is just a new price and it doesn't even
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target the russians jamie because tariff obviously that gets put on by the minister of finance and so
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farmers are actually going to be writing a big check to the federal government and so between that and some
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of their other regulations on the environment for fertilizer um they're actually making it harder
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for farmers to plan they're making it harder for for farmers to plant and will make it harder for them
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uh to be able to compete on the international stage at a critical time where we need to be not just uh
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we not just feeding canadians but feeding the world so you know jamie this particular motion was so
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important for all those reasons and more but uh i'm shamefully the spend ep liberal uh coalition
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decided to vote it down and uh that's a real shame because rather than look at pragmatic solutions
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today of ways we can help canadians today they just say oh it's a conservative motion and dismiss it
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out of hand and uh you can hear by the the quality of the debate in the house they're not interested
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in looking after people's uh their own their own uh canadians interests they're literally saying you
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know if it's a conservative proposition just throw it out so they're being punitive and uh cannes
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bergen was right up front at the beginning of the debate look don't vote for us but vote for your
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constituents because this will help them to deal with the biggest cost of living uh crisis we've seen
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in this country in 30 plus years yeah it really is out of control and philip in the last parliament you
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had a piece of legislation a private member's bill to help give some relief to some farmers so
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so we've been talking about this for quite some time because it has been building yeah so i'll talk
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about farmers obviously that's uh the number one driver and in my constituency economically is our
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farmers they're out there working every day they work so hard during covet 19 even with all the
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struggles we had they kept producing the food and kept us fed the and they'll be increasingly
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important with the geopolitical issues in russia and elsewhere that are preventing food from getting
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the market it is absolutely critical that our farmers produce more food than they ever had not
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just to feed canada but to feed the world and what does this government do it continues to put in
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punitive sanctions so the tariffs on fertilizers as dan so apt talked about carbon tax our farmers are
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paying tens of thousands of dollars the government tried to put in a stopgap measure but their solution
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to the inequitable amount of the carbon tax that farmers have paid is to send that money back all the
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way to ottawa and then they'll send some of it back based on what they think should go back to them
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ben lob has a fantastic private member's bill that uh it carries forward hopefully goes the last
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stretch uh that my private member's bill starts it actually gives farmers an exemption of natural gas
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and propane off the carbon tax right um it is it's really costing some of the farmers jamie and my
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writing tens of thousands of dollars and this is when we need our farmers the most and instead of
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empowering them we're penalizing them well it says here the canadian press uh june 6th one in five
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canadians reported going hungry at least once between march of when the pandemic started in 2020
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and now that is absolutely incredible in a country like ours well one in five canadians are struggling
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and let's put into context food banks are at the brink there is just too much demand and what does
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this government do rather than you know get their uh you know roll up their sleeves and get to work
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instead we have a finance minister that's too busy as deputy prime minister and we have a prime minister
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that likes to act like a prime minister on tv only he's not actually getting in in briefed on the issues
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and he's not presenting ideas that will work for canadians today so uh you know everyone who's watching
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the podcast jamie can know that the conservative caucus here in ottawa are doing everything we can
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to put those ideas in front of government fortunately uh those spend ep liberals you know
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unless unless it is drawing money from people that they get to spend on their own uh priorities jamie
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they're they're instead uh focusing on that we're focused on as phil said letting people keep their
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money letting them jump on the opportunities let them feed their families in the best way that they know
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how people aren't asking for a lot they're just asking for a government that cares about them today
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that's not what they're getting and that's how you spur the economy more money and circular more money
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being spent on priorities of the individual is how you keep the economy from slowing down uh right now
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we're just seeing less and less people with money it was interesting the the former finance minister
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bill morneau which ran huge deficits before the pandemic even when the economy was doing well he
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came out and said the liberals were focusing more on wealth redistribution than actually creating
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economic opportunities for canadians yeah uh we have long-term issues as well as our sort of
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circular um short-term issues as well canada is is struggling productivity wise and over the last
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seven years that's gotten way worse currently out of 36 oecd nations we are 25th um of course we need
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to be concerned about how wealth is distributed across our country and making sure the most vulnerable
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are taken care of but we also have to look at the economic drivers economic growth uh when we grow
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the pie larger that means there's more for everyone when that pie shrinks not only does it mean there's
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less for everyone it's often the most vulnerable who are hurt this recent budget had very little if
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anything that will encourage economic growth economic growth is the driver of our economy it's what
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allows uh it's what allows promotions it's what allows business creators we need a culture of winning in
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canada we need to drive that economic growth and this budget had nothing uh to offer canadians for
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economic growth so yep and just and just that point um i i think it's important to note uh when in the
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previous harper government when mr harper and minister flaherty cut the gst offering real tax relief
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every day in front of canadians every time they go to a store they would get that gst or they would
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see that reduction from seven percent to five percent we actually kept the rebate checks for low income
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persons especially seniors on fixed income so when you have you're exactly right when you have a strong
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economy when you have where the the the uh free enterprise system where you have those entrepreneurs
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that can jump at those opportunities and create wealth that ends up working for everyone's best
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interest because then government has a social safety net that we can rely on and uh you know the only
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thing i would agree with uh the former minister bill mordeaux in his comments is he's absolutely right
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this government is always focused on cutting up the pie they have no idea how to grow it and you know
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when he was finance minister he put money into super clusters that weren't so super it's been an
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invisible failure that was a uh you know he has a canadian infrastructure bank that canadians can't bank
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on the only people that can bank on the canadian infrastructure bank at this point are his
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executives and their bonuses so while while you know i'll agree with the former minister about that
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uh that this government has no idea how to grow that pie uh he's a big part uh he's the one that
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set the sale with justin trudeau at the very beginning of their mandate and uh so it's a bit
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rich coming from someone like bill morneau you wonder why dan why he might be trying to distance himself
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from this government yeah well if i can if i had a barge pole and i was bill morneau i'd be barge
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pulling away from from that government well we don't want to be all doom and gloom but it you know high
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energy prices we've got high food prices interest rates are on the rise that is showing a number of
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if you look back through history there are some pretty big warning signs that we're we're running
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into but this is also a government where nothing is really going right we have lineups outside service
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canada for for passports we have immigration system that's backlogged up to two million files that they
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just can't process we have veterans still waiting in line to get their benefits and yet there as dan you
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pointed out and as mentioned this is a government that says yeah we can take more on our plate in
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the form of daycare or other priorities that they're mixing with the ndp i don't trust them to do anything
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right at this point how their solution is let's just keep piling more onto this this system we have
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this federal system yeah i mean i think you make an excellent point jamie if you're not doing the
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essential services well why are you expanding beyond that right and this this government is incompetent
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it's corrupt and increasingly getting tired meaning it's exhausting any of the new ideas that it did
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bring to the table we see that whatever capacity we want to look at whether it be delivering passports
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whether it be accommodating allowing newcomers to come to our country they are failing at every turn
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while we just saw at pearson airport what a disaster that is for the punitive mandates that we yet to see
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any science to support we continue to see this this tired corrupt incompetent liberal government fail
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well on the west coast you saw the port of vancouver was cited in an international survey as being one
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of the worst in the developed world so there's a reason why we have some of these supply chain issues
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it's because the government is not managing its business and like phil said if you can't even get
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someone a passport uh you know you can ask well why would they want more from a government that can't
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even uh do a payroll system for its own employees properly now they're saying that they can expand
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the state uh to do everything look this is why we need a conservative government there's uh you know
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a leadership race going on i'm not going to get into it other than to say there's a real appetite
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from canadians right now for to change the channel yep on the failures of justin trudeau well you
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have a province that is run by an ndp government uh like like even their federal cousins are talking
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about taking excess profits first of all what is excess profits but from certain companies and
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redistributing again but this is specifically in the oil and gas industry but this is an industry
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that has been trying to expand as long as i can remember and offset russian gas which is causing a lot
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of the problems and the disruptions but it's been bad government policy that's been stopping this
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industry from from providing that that responsible energy and and so the ndp said well because we've got
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a supply and demand issue let's just take whatever we feel is excess that i to me that is very scary
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to start talking about that in a country that has already been hurt with investment fleeing elsewhere
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well look the uh canadian energy sector has been hit so hard ever since justin trudeau came to office c
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48 c69 all of these bills just have been constantly pouring cold water over an industry we should be
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very proud of uh as environmental leaders as producers of clean tech uh as producers of wealth both uh you
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know for employees as well as uh for uh investors uh that's the kind of thing that attracts like you said
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uh investment here but let's put it into context they have become profitable because of uh but they
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did so um by by being profitable at low forty dollar a barrel uh for oil and they had to let go hundreds
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of thousands of individuals uh in alberta in saskatchewan some parts of manitoba and because people were
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coming in from all over there they let all those newfoundland and labrador everywhere exactly and so they
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learned to become profitable there but they haven't been able to hire all the engineers and designers
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to expand and grow so for so given that we actually have it where world prices right now are are
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skyrocketing uh what's what's ended up have are they reinvesting those profits that they have right
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now in canada they're not and uh they're just sending them to dividends so that's something we should
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be keeping an eye on it's the culture it's the environment that justin trudeau and his ndp
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extreme left allies have created an anti-investment uh zone around canada and so uh look you know it
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used to be in the old days where you would have it where okay we're doing well as a business let's
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grow let's expand let's hire that's not happening right now and that's squarely on justin trudeau
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world prices you know that's something maybe we can have a good debate about but the investment
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culture we have it's like and you mentioned british columbia john horgan and his ndp government
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have made it so that forestry one of our our our steadfast for generations it's it's an economic
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driver for many rural communities so many uh forestry companies in bc they aren't leaving forestry jamie
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they're leaving bc and where are they going they're going to jurisdictions like louisiana in the united
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states why they don't have a carbon tax they don't have a lot of red tape and they don't have
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uncertainty like we have here in canada so that falls 100 at the feet of justin trudeau and john
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horgan they're the first ministers for their respective government and i will tell you when
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people are seeing these gas prices at the pumps to hear john horgan say think before you drive yeah
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take public transit or to even hear justin trudeau say just buy an electric car
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yeah that's not that's these these are not solutions people need to be able to get to
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their job they need to be able to get their medical appointments especially in rural areas
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and you know what they don't have publicly funded uh public transit to take well yeah especially when
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you know it's pretty arrogant to say oh just go buy this just just go do this right like there's there
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are so many issues but in our energy portfolio our conversation is about a plus b right the left just
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wants to minus a and have b which is not in abundance is not rapidly affordable is not
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easily deployable so i think that's a different conversation but we talked about the anchors of
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the economy we've talked forestry uh oil and natural gas mining those are all industries that
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are hurting right now and they're not seeing those investment dollars come into this country it's really
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shameful absolutely and uh they said they the final you see a dissonance actually and uh in their
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argument right they will talk about the importance the finance minister will the and others in the
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liberal government about the importance of economic growth and they'll also say that productivity is
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important its productivity is a key driver to our shared prosperity but one of the way that one of the
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ways that we measure productivity is the amount contributed uh to the gdp per hour per worker
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in canada the average is fifty dollars that's one of the lowest in the oecd of the developed nations
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uh however our our standout our standout industry is is the oil and gas industry where it's five
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hundred dollars that's ten times our average in productivity and so if we do want to share if we
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do want to grow that prosperity we want to grow that pie it goes through our oil and gas industry uh
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and to say anything other than that is is not true of course we want to grow our renewables of course we
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want to grow our green industry but those aren't things we can flip the switch and turn on if we allow as you
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said the the the energy companies to reinvest those proceeds into greater technology not only will
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we grow that natural resource industry but we'll grow the spin-off industries from that we'll grow
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our economy we'll start to bridge that innovation gap that canada is currently facing a dollar in the hand
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of the individual creates businesses creates jobs opportunity wealth well just to his point in 2014
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canada hit the high watermark for investment in clean technology it was over a hundred billion dollars of new
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announceable projects in 2020 where is it at half of that why because justin trudeau has created an
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anti-investment uh climate here in canada and uh you know that's that's where phil is 100 right if we
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want to do this right we need to involve industry we need to make sure we're drawing on that innovation
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and you know what when the ndp and uh or as i call them the spend dp liberals propose things like
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excessive profits your point who gets to decide what's excessive uh they've done this to the banks
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look i'm no fan of the banks but this is what the banks will do in response they'll say okay you're
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going to tax us more we'll raise user fees we'll close offices in uh or you know banks in rural canada
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uh we'll let people go uh because they they're going to be looking for their shareholders and like i
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said if they don't feel they can grow in a country if the ndp liberals started doing that to the to our
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oil and gas uh they would kill the industry you know what there's so much we can do in this country
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jamie all entrepreneurs want is the chance that's right and government needs to get out of the way
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on these things get right out of the way well we've run way over time i think so uh we'll as you
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both know we always give the guests the the last word to say whatever they want maybe we can use this
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time to talk about what we're doing what we plan on doing as a conservative government in waiting
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and what we're planning to do for the next little bit as parliament kind of wraps up in the next week
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or so and how we are continuing to fight for those struggling with this cost of living crisis maybe we'll
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start with philip thanks yeah so as we talked about today i plan to and uh in my role to continue to
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fight for canadians i want our country that is not uh canada doesn't exist for the government exists
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for canadians we want to give them control of their lives back we want to give them the freedom
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they deserve and we want to grow that pie and we know that ultimately the success of canada will
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come from the great people from coast to coast to coast not from some government program in ottawa
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yeah well we've seen that uh when liberals feel challenged and right now the uh the economic
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situation of canadians and canadians are phoning their members of parliament because i know liberal and
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ndp members who've said their their constituents are mad as can be about things like inflation
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uh so expect everyone so get your seat belts on they're going to start pulling out divisive issues
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from south of the border i called the prime minister in the house of commons our largest importer
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of american political political uh issues uh because that's what they want they want canadians to
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divide i call them our divider in chief and you know what um you know we have to keep on them we
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have to keep pushing them to do better every g7 country is doing things to protect their citizens
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from high gas prices and runaway inflation the british are cutting fuel taxes and looking at more
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the americans are started using their strategic reserve germany germany is adding 16 billion dollar
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tax plan to deal with fuel high fuel costs what has this government done zero nada nothing and so we
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need to be calling on them to do better uh we're g7 country he needs to start acting like a leader of
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one it's almost as if the liberals aren't happy unless they're making people's lives miserable but
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that's just my observation thank you very much dan elvis member of parliament for central okanagan
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samilkamy nickley also the finance finance soon to be finance minister maybe the shadow finance minister
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for uh finance and we also have philip lawrence a member of parliament for north humberland peterborough south
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also the shadow minister for the federal economic development agency of eastern central and southern
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ontario a bit of geography forum thank you very much for joining us today remember new content every
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