It’s Budget Day! (but you may want to hold your applause)
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Summary
Jasraj Hallin, the Finance Critic in the House of Commons, joins us to talk about Budget Day, the day some of us have been waiting for, and why we need a Conservative government.
Transcript
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Hello and welcome once again to The Blueprint. This is Canada's Conservative Podcast. I'm your
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host, Jamie Schmael, member of Parliament for Halliburton, Cawortho-Legs, Brock, with new content
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for you every single Tuesday at 1.30 p.m. Eastern Time. We ask that you like, comment, subscribe,
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and share this program. Of course, you can download it on platforms like CastBox, iTunes,
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Google Play, and Spotify, and you will want to do it because today is Budget Day, the day some of us
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have been waiting for. And to talk about that, and of course, much, much more, we have Jasraj Hallin,
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the member of Parliament for Calgary Forest Lawn, also the finance critic. Thanks for coming on the
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show again. Hey, Jamie, thanks for having me. And within a year, a second time, I must have done
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something good the last time. Absolutely. I think the ratings went through the roof when you showed
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up, so we have to have you back on. Happy to help in any way I can. And of course, it's Budget Day
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today. That's right. I think painful for some. We're going to find out how bad the books are
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or what they project and all that good stuff. But I don't usually do this. I think we're going to
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start with the clip because we were talking off air how this clip is just cringeworthy. Okay,
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it's the finance minister talking about the budget. Let's get Super Producer Nick to queue up
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Cut 1. Let's play Cut 1 and then we'll get into it. Right now, for too many young Canadians,
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the promise of Canada, the kind of Canada that older Canadians came of age in, it doesn't feel
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like it's working. People can have a good job. They can be working hard, but they are just not sure
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that's going to lead to a safe and prosperous and secure life, including being able to buy your own
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home. And that's something that we have to do something about.
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Who's been in charge the last eight or so years when stuff started to get a little rocky?
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It's like she just woke up and it's like, what's just been happening? What do you make of this?
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Jamie, we can finally agree on something with her. Can you believe it? Isn't she kind of saying
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that Canada feels broken? Isn't that what she got from that clip? I think she got around to that,
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yes. But of course, after eight years of this, NDP government spending more than every government
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before them combined, causing 40-year highs in inflation, causing the most rapid interest rate
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hikes that never seen in Canadian history. And then on top of that, slamming on taxes like the
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carbon tax scam onto Canadians with some of the worst policies, the worst productivity growth that
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we've ever seen in this country. Of course, everyone's going to feel like that. She's absolutely right.
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She just forgot to mention, it's after eight years of her government that we're here now.
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Even the Prime Minister, like there was about a year ago, they were saying almost the effect that
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Canadians never had it so good. So they finally spoke to a few of their constituents, it seems,
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realized that, yeah, outside the bubble, life is getting pretty hard. And it's like they just woke up,
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the Prime Minister seemed the other day like, yeah, housing's really bad.
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It's like, you've been in charge. How is this news to you all of a sudden?
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Absolutely. And look, the sad part is that they can deny, deflect all they want. And they can try to blame
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others for the problems that they've caused. But the reality is, is that Canadians are the ones paying
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for the incompetency of this government. We see two million people visiting a food bank in a single month.
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And just this year, a million more will visit a food bank. A third of those people are going to be children.
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Can you believe that? People are going hungry in this country. People are, there's people with good
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paying jobs. She's right. There are people that are doing all the right things that were promised
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this thing called the Canadian dream, like immigrant families like mine who came here,
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or the ones that have lived here their whole life. But that Canada is not Canada anymore to a lot of people.
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The promise of Canada is not there. When you see people with good paying jobs, sometimes in some cases,
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double income earners in one house, having to go to a food bank, or living out of their cars.
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Some students are living under bridges. This is the reality of incompetent policies of a liberal
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NDP government that keeps telling you you've never had it so good over and over again. Yet the reality
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is, is it's a complete opposite. We need to reverse course and we need a common sense conservative
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government under Pierre Polyev to make sure that we restore that Canadian dream once again.
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Even, even how they've been dealing with it, right? So the, the first was to die, deny it was even
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happening that, that people shouldn't believe their lion eyes when they picked up a pack of bacon or a
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chicken from the grocery store and notice that the price just keeps going up with a package keeps
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getting smaller for the same or more price. Like they denied it. Then they finally came to realize it.
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And now we're going to see the budget later on today in just a few hours. And we're going to see how
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the, the people who promised utopia and only a bit more time, a bit more resources, and we'll get
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there, will propose the next stage of their plan. Absolutely. And look, what Canadians can expect
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from this government's budget is going to be more pain, more debt, more deficit, more false promises.
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Never forget that this is, this is the same government, and Christia Freeland, who said just
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two years ago that we will, we're on a path to balance the budget. And then she turned around
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and said, just kidding. She did a complete 180 and said, we'll balance the budget.
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In a couple of days too. Yeah, yeah. Never. And that's, that's the track record of this government.
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But what does that mean? That means that we saw just recently, the Bank of Canada had to hold their
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rates once again. That means they're holding high rates for longer. All those mortgage borrowers or
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renters or people looking to get into the, into housing, or those especially that are going to
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renew their mortgages, are devastated by that news. It's a slap in the face of hardworking Canadians
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who are just looking for some light. But it's the governor of the Bank of Canada that kept,
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that has repeated over and over again, if the government does not stop spending and create
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these deficits like they keep doing, it's going to be harder and harder for them to bring down these
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interest rates. He's the governor of the Bank of Canada has admitted now twice that the government's
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fiscal policy, their spending, their deficits, and his one lever of increasing interest rates
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to try to tame inflation are working in opposite directions. The government is working in opposite
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direction of what the governor of the Bank of Canada is doing. Although it is the governor of
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the Bank of Canada that also allowed it to get this bad, that let Justin Trudeau print so much money
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that it got to the point that is today. And now we see Canada and Canadians are most at risk in the G7
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for a mortgage default crisis because of those high interest rates. There's people that are renewing
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their mortgages at double and sometimes triple the rate. That can be up to $1,000 extra a month that
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they have to take out of their, their, their paychecks, which by the way, payroll taxes went up April,
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January the 1st as well. And on April the 1st, Canadians got slammed with another 23% increase
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on the carbon tax scam. I'm glad you brought up the Bank of Canada because I, I, I can imagine
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the stress that the governor is under when, when looking at the, the big picture, right? You have
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a housing crisis, you have houses being built, but in some cases, owners not able to take possession
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because the rates have skyrocketed to the point where they can't afford those houses. Some people
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have lost value on their houses because might have bought for higher rates, all of this and much,
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much more, all contributing at the same thing. But at the core of it all is the government's fiscal
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policy that will not allow this relief to come. Absolutely. On top of Justin Trudeau spending
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$600 billion, that's more than every government before him combined that made that inflation rate
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at 40 year highs that made, you know, the interest rates go up. On top of that, right now we see the
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top line inflation number as high as it is. It's above what, what it should be.
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One of the contributing factors to that, and when we're talking about the governor of the Bank of
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Canada that he admitted to was the carbon tax. The carbon tax contributes to 0.6 of that total
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inflation number on its own. And any, any increase in that, like we saw on April the 1st, it's an extra
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0.15 percent on top of that. So when our common sense leader, common sense conservative leader,
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Pierre Polyev talks about axing the tax, it's not just making cost of gas, groceries and home heating
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more, less expensive. What it also means is taking that 0.6 plus the any type, any increase off of the
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total inflation number. What does that mean for Canadians and, and, you know, mortgage borrowers
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are that interest rates could come down faster if we got rid of the tax. That's how
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much pain this carbon tax scam is causing on Canadians. Justin Trudeau and the NDP are absolutely
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obsessed with this carbon tax scam. Although 70% of Canadians and 70% of premiers are telling them to,
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first they ask them to spike the hike, but they're against this tax because of how much pain it's
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causing in their lives. Absolutely. But the Liberals will say there is no, the increase isn't felt,
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right? The carbon tax doesn't really do anything. At that point, I say, well, then raise the price of
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the carbon tax. If you're so confident it doesn't do anything, raise the price and see what happens
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to the cost of everything, right? Yeah, well, it goes to a lot of the falsehoods. You know, one of the,
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one of the biggest lies was Canadians get more back in these so-called rebates. Well,
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the public budgeting officer, the parliamentary budgeting officer, the one that Justin Trudeau
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appointed, by the way, proved that on average, more Canadian families will be worse off than what
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they get back in these so-called rebates. And that's why we say so-called because I'll give you
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two quick examples. In Alberta, an average family will pay $2,900 into this tax. By the, by the government's
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own admission, Christia Freeland at committee, she said she was bragging about Albertans getting
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$1,800 back. She is way off on these so-called rebates. And Ontario, where you're from and where
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she's from, an average family will pay $1,600 into this tax. They only get $1,000 back. So on average,
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Canadian families are worse off. The second lie was that this is somehow supposed to fix the environment,
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supposed to fix emissions. Their own government department says, well, we're not even tracking that.
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And, and think about it. Why would you? Maybe, maybe it's like Trudeau, it's not worth the cost
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to track it because they'll see that there's no, it's not bringing down emissions. Emissions have not
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come down. And in fact, Canada fell in the ranking for its climate plan from 50, from 58 to 62 out of 67.
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Yeah. We fell in our ranking, yet they brag about this carbon tax that's supposed to
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leave more money in Canadians' pockets and make us better off with the environment. It's done none of
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that, except caused more, it's had more economic pain and less environmental gain. And I think that
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plays into what we're seeing on the ground in, in, in, in Canada, right? Like you're having a, you're
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having a governing class of people telling you everything's okay, or we'll fix it with another
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government program. Costs still seem to go up. Taxes seem to go up. Life gets harder and harder,
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but the governing class is saying, we got this and nothing is actually happening to better their
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lives because you can't tax your way to prosperity. That's right. You know, it's like the arsonist
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fireman that lights the fire and has the hose in their hand that says, I'm going to look like a hero,
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but there's not that much water coming out. So they're, they're trying, but it's not fixing the
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fire that, and literally the fire that they're doing, the fire is the fire, is the, the flames of
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inflation. They keep pouring more and more fuel on top of it. And that's why interest rates are so high.
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This is why people can't make payments. This is why on average people's, more and more people's
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paychecks are going towards shelter and housing costs. It's because the government keeps on spending
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money and the governor cannot lower those interest rates because of that. And then they get the
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pile on effect of this carbon tax scam, where it, you know, you're, you're, you're going to charge
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the tax to the farmer who create, makes the food. You're going to charge a trucker who ships the food.
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You're going to put that tax, the same tax on the people that sell the food. At the end of the day,
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the Canadians buying food are going to have to pay that tax ultimately. So you're right. They have
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these, you know, these so-called solutions or, or they call it, you know, these band-aid solutions.
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But at the end of the day, until Canadians can see lower costs at the gas pump,
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at the grocery store, on their rent and mortgage payments, they're not really going to see much of
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a difference in their life. But that can only happen under a common sense, conservative government.
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Under Pierre Polyev, that's going to axe the tax, build the homes, fix the budget and stop the crime.
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Let's queue up cut two. In this, in, in this clip, we're going to hear from Jenna Sud,
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she's the Minister of Families and Social Development. Government has a few ways to raise
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revenue, right? Taxing, printing, borrowing. Those are pretty much it, right? We've seen a combination
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of all those during the last few years. Of course, you know, you can't really borrow too much more.
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You can't print anymore. You're going to, you know, devalue the currency even more, cause
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further price inflation as well. So we got to talk about taxes. So let's play cut two
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and have a, have a listen to what Minister Suns has to say. Play cut two.
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Your government no longer seems to care about budget secrecy. You've announced, you know,
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already seven different measures that, that it will be in the budget. So I, why, why does there
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need to be any secrecy around taxes? I don't think there, there's anything to be said about secrecy,
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Vachie. I think what you're seeing leading up to the budget is us sharing some of those thoughts,
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some of those investments as we get closer to budget day. Of course, there'll be more to come,
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come April 16th. And I trust that we'll be able to have that conversation again.
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So can I ask you to be clear? Will there be new taxes?
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As I said, we'll see the budget as it comes out on April 16th.
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So no clear answer at this point on whether or not, I can't say for sure that there won't,
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to Canadians watching tonight, there won't be any new taxes.
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What do you think? The budget's a few hours away.
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Ridiculous. Ridiculous. The flip-flop, the flip-flop, the backpedaling, the backtracking,
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because how can you trust this government? Like I said, they're literally lighting the fire
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and fueling those flames with more and more inflation.
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Look, our message has been clear about what we want from this budget. We want to see them axe the tax,
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especially Bill C-234, that would take the carbon tax off for our farmers and our food.
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That's demand number one by Pierre Polyev. Number two, we need them to cap the spending.
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We want them to bring in a dollar-for-dollar law that would help bring down the cost of government
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spending. We need to cap that spending or what we call fix the budget. We need to build more homes and
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not more bureaucracy. We've seen this government shovel billions of dollars and make these grand
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announcements and photo ops that have created more bureaucracy. They literally are shoveling more
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money to say, create another department. We want to see action. So we have a real plan. Our leader has
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tabled that plan, that we want to see municipalities have 15 percent more permits closed. And if they don't
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meet that target, it should be just like a salesperson or like a builder. If you can meet the target or
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exceed it, you will get a bonus in infrastructure funds. If you don't meet it, then we'll withhold
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that money until that target is met. Because for too long under Justin Trudeau, there's been lots
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of bureaucracy created and lots of, you know, dangling of lots of money for just these great photo ops
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beside these ministers. But no homes have been built. And in fact, there's going to be less homes built
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this year than when in the 1970s when we had way less population. Can you believe that?
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That's true. That's true. And those high interest rates that we keep talking about are stopping
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builders from building and buyers from buying. So we need, we need to see to them axe attacks,
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we need to see build the homes and we want them to cap the spending. Simple.
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Not for them. Not for them. And you used to be a builder in a previous life. That's right.
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So you know all about this. Look, whether you're a builder or everyday Canadian,
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no one is saying we want more government in our lives. And we know that that's the path that this
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liberal NDP government wants Canada to go down is have the government control everything you watch,
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everything you say, everything you do, and what you do with your money. And in contrast,
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we have a common sense conservative leader, the next Prime Minister, Pierre Polyev,
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that wants to give you back your freedom, wants to restore that Canadian dream that everyone either
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came here for or that's known that their whole life until we've seen eight years of Justin Trudeau.
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That is the dream that he is going to restore with our common sense plan to do our four simple
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things. It will take a lot of work to undo what these Liberals have done, but we will axe a tax,
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build a homes, fix a budget, and stop the crime. Let's free up taxpayers' money from taxation. Let's
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Canadians put that money to work into the economy. Let's get economic growth happening in this country.
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Our book's under control. Let the Bank of Canada reduce interest rates so that people can afford
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to be happy again. That's right. And to your point, productivity has not gone up in this country.
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No, it hasn't. The Bank of Canada literally broke the emergency glass saying,
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this is a huge threat to Canada's prosperity. Our GDP per capita is declining. It's been declining for
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six straight quarters. It's worse than it was since 2018. And what does that mean? That means Canadians
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are getting poorer. It's because Justin Trudeau and NDP, with their really bad policies, anti-business,
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anti-growth policies, like their anti-energy, anti-Alberta, anti-any-resource policy has been
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driving more and more business out of Canada, less investment coming in. Literally, we just saw
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Greece come here. Yes. First it was Germany, then it was Japan, now Greece. For some reason,
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Justin Trudeau cannot find a business case for growth and powerful paychecks for our people,
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but he can sure find a business case to give dollars to dictators abroad that, you know,
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helps them fuel their wars like we see with Putin and other places that don't have environmental
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standards like Canada does or human rights standards. This is after years of Justin Trudeau.
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We need to have common sense back. We need to get Canada looking like it's back and open for business
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again so that we can get powerful paychecks for our people, get our economy. We can get growth here,
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productivity. And hey, if we want to help with global emissions, one great way is to replace
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that dirty dictator oil with clean, low carbon Canadian energy. I love it. All right. I got to
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let you go because budget's coming down. I'm sure you have a lot of things to do, but I do appreciate
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your time coming out. As you know, the guests get the final word, so take it away. Jamie, look, I'll just
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have to, I'll say once again, we're going to keep fighting for Canadians. And in this budget, we want
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them to axe the tax, build the homes and not bureaucracy and cap the spending. And once we have
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Pierre Polyev as the Prime Minister of Canada, we're going to axe the tax, bring down the cost of gas,
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groceries and home heating. We're going to build the homes and not bureaucracy by incentivizing
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municipalities to build, build, build. We're going to fix the budget so that inflation and interest
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rates can come down and that people don't have to worry about losing their homes by implementing a
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dollar-for-dollar law. So every dollar spent by any department, they have to find a dollar of saving.
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That is how we're going to control the spending and get rid of wasteful things like 22 billion dollars
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in consultants because the ministers are too incompetent, these liberal ministers, to do their own job.
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And last, we see all across this country, Jamie, crime, chaos, disorder like we've never seen before.
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We need to bring back solid policies like we saw under the Harper government, and that's what's going to stop the crime.
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We're going to focus on jail and not bail for repeat offenders and bring back mandatory minimums
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so those repeat offenders will stay in jail and not get bail and be relaxed like we see these soft
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on crime policies that have wreaked havoc on our country, where people are saying this is not the
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same Canada that we knew before. That's the restoring of the Canadian dream that Pierre Polyev as Prime
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Minister is going to do. Sounds like common sense to me. Common sense. We're going to bring it home.
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I love it. Jazraz Hallin, thanks very much for coming on the show again.
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I do appreciate your time, love your message, and we'll look forward to seeing you really busy
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in just a few hours dealing with the budget and the fallout from it.
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Thanks again. Thank you for your time, and thank you for yours.
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Don't forget to like, comment, subscribe, and share this program. I guarantee you,
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Tuesday, 1.30 p.m. Eastern Time. Until next week, remember, low taxes, less government,