Pat Kelly
Calgary Crowfoot, Alberta · Conservative · Canada
“They are the same Liberals who spent the last 11 years actively preventing Canada from diversifying its export markets by systematically preventing the construction of the energy infrastructure necessary to export Canadian energy to the world. Canadian oil and gas is by far Canada's most valuable export. It dwarfs everything else.”
“I thought that might mean that a year after he made these claims, there would be some kind of approval on the horizon for a pipeline project. I could easily imagine that.”
“If it had been built, it would be carrying 525,000 barrels a day today to world markets. At today's prices, that would bring about $20 billion per year to the Canadian economy. Would we be in a recession today, if the Canadian economy had another 525,000 barrels a day in exported production?”
“Madam Speaker, the member brings up the Trans Mountain pipeline and, again, Conservatives were not calling upon the government to buy the Trans Mountain pipeline and build it themselves.”
“They ran up deficits in the eighties that were so big that by the time the Liberals were defeated in 1984, Canada was literally kiting interest payments by issuing new debt just to cover the interest on the existing debt.”
“She said that, based on the government's stress tests, which, “draws on decades of Canadian economic and fiscal history, including, recessions, financial crises, oil price crashes, and runs thousands of combinations to show the range of possibilities....that the likelihood that the deficit-to-GDP ratio will decline...is less than 1 per ce…”
The complete record
Every one of 352 lines we hold for Pat Kelly, in date order, each linked to its source. Free to read, in full, without an account. Page 1 of 8.
“Madam Speaker, the member spoke earlier in the debate on Alto, and I know how sensitive the people in his riding are about expropriation. Going beyond the expropriation issue, just some cocktail-napkin math here, if it costs $90 billion and, as the McGill study said, there are only going to be 12 million annual passengers, and they borrow the money at, let us say, 4%, that is about $300 a ticket. Does the member think that the Liberals have done their homework in any way on what the actual cost would be in order for that project to be financially viable?”
“Madam Speaker, in his speech, the member called upon the government to turn down the arrogance a bit. The Liberals have a majority and they can win any vote they want. They could start being just a little more humble about their performance. I would note that the Minister of Finance recently appeared at the finance committee. He did not answer any of the member's questions. He did not answer any of my questions. He ignored the questions that were put to him by opposition members. Does the member have anything else to say about the government's performance and the need for a little humility, given that performance?”
“Madam Speaker, I do not know, it probably is. We did not ask the federal government to borrow public money to build that pipeline. We asked it to get out of the way, so that a private business would invest its money without a hit to the public treasury and allow the thing to get built on its own. I do not know why the Bloc seems keen to call on Conservatives to defend that decision. We never defended that decision.”
“Madam Speaker, the Liberal government simply seems oblivious to the struggle of real Canadians, whether they are seniors, young people or really anybody. The Liberal government seems more focused on these large bureaucratic structures, giving itself more power to use public money to interfere in what would normally be private investment decisions. I can only imagine where its sovereign wealth fund is going to take us in the world of corporate welfare and insider enrichment. I do not believe that the Liberals are in touch with what is going on on the ground.”
“Madam Speaker, the member brings up the Trans Mountain pipeline and, again, Conservatives were not calling upon the government to buy the Trans Mountain pipeline and build it themselves. They were calling upon the government to stop moving the goalposts on their approval process so that Kinder Morgan would commit and build it at its own expense. Conservatives do not believe in the public sector taking over and intruding on that which should be left to private investors. Let us just get the government out of the way, so that actual private investors, with their own money, will invest in Canada's energy infrastructure and allow our production to increase. This is not about subsidizing anything. This is about getting the government out of the way.”
“Madam Speaker, here we go again. Another Liberal, who would tell Canadians they have never had it so good and will deny that they are in recession, deny that the PBO and private sector economists have downgraded their growth projections and deny that they are misleading the House in their budgets.”
“Given the fact that Canada is in a recession and the government's budget outlook is deteriorating and lacks credibility, Conservatives ask this House to call on the government to reverse its 11 years of continued deficits and broken fiscal promises, and rein in its spending and borrowing before things really do spiral out of its control.”
“Canadians are increasingly asking why the Liberals cannot table a plan to return to the balanced budget they started with in 2015. Many witnesses at the finance committee have called upon them to do so. However, the minister , in his arrogance and hubris, refuses and lectures those who ask him to simply do what his government promised to do way back in 2015. It is not just the PBO, not just the finance committee witnesses and not just Conservatives challenging the wisdom and credibility of the government's budgets; two of Canada's major banks have dropped reports downgrading their forecasts for the Canadian economy to below 1%.”
“The finance minister is like a sailor who forgets to connect the anchor chain to the boat, then drops the anchor in the water and has to go back to the chandlery to get a new one while everybody on the dock laughs at him. I can only imagine what next year's fiscal anchor is going to be. This latest anchor, the one that is already on the bottom of the ocean with no chain allowing the budget to drift toward the rocks, was never even a good anchor to start with. In fact, the PBO notes that the IMF thinks Canada would be better off with its old anchor of a declining debt-to-GDP ratio, but that anchor is also overboard on the bottom of the ocean. It has been dumped overboard without a chain I do not know how many times.”
“She said that, based on the government's stress tests, which, “draws on decades of Canadian economic and fiscal history, including, recessions, financial crises, oil price crashes, and runs thousands of combinations to show the range of possibilities....that the likelihood that the deficit-to-GDP ratio will decline...is less than 1 per cent.” That was the Liberals' latest fiscal anchor, the one they came up with when their last fiscal anchor was cut loose. They said that the deficit would decline as a percentage of GDP every year through 2031. The PBO said that the odds of that happening are less than 1%. After 11 years, they have made promise after promise about fiscal anchors and guardrails and have broken every single one of them.”
“The Parliamentary Budget Officer published a report that said that the deficit would be billions of dollars higher than the finance minister said in his budget. It would be higher this year, higher next year and every year in the projection. The Parliamentary Budget Officer said that spending would be higher. She said that borrowing would be higher. She said expected income tax revenues would be lower because she expects Canadians will have less income than the finance minister projects.”
“They ran up deficits in the eighties that were so big that by the time the Liberals were defeated in 1984, Canada was literally kiting interest payments by issuing new debt just to cover the interest on the existing debt. That disastrous time under the Liberals took successive governments, Conservative, Liberal and Conservative, to restore sanity to Canada's finances. Now the current government is threatening to take us back to those dark times. After Pierre Trudeau, there was a consensus that balanced budgets matter and ought to be every government's goal. The Liberals have blown it, despite their 2015 promise. Last week, there was a series of terrible reports that challenged the very credibility of the government and the finance minister .”
“(1215) So far, all the government has done is create a so-called Major Projects Office that will have incredible sweeping powers of exemption from Canadian law. It was set up nearly a full year ago and there are no major projects. On top of the economic self-harm the Liberals have imposed on Canada, 11 years of incessant debt, deficits and money printing have left Canadians deeply in debt and unable to afford necessities. As bad as Bill Morneau and Chrystia Freeland were, the current finance minister is even worse. He might end up challenging Allan MacEachen and Marc Lalonde as perhaps the worst finance minister in Canadian history. Do members remember those guys?”
“If it had been built, it would be carrying 525,000 barrels a day today to world markets. At today's prices, that would bring about $20 billion per year to the Canadian economy. Would we be in a recession today, if the Canadian economy had another 525,000 barrels a day in exported production? I do not know, but it would be better than what we have now. What if Canada had built an east coast pipeline too? Let us think of what that would mean for world energy security and what it would mean for the Canadian economy. The opportunities squandered by the Liberals contribute to the recession we are in now. They have prevented Canada from being part of the international solution to world markets that are cut off from the Middle East and from those that want to defund Putin's war machine.”
“I thought that might mean that a year after he made these claims, there would be some kind of approval on the horizon for a pipeline project. I could easily imagine that. In fact, I could imagine maybe one like the Pacific north coast pipeline that the previous Conservative government approved and that the Liberals cancelled only a few days after they were sworn in, in November 2015, a decision endorsed by the current Prime Minister at an energy committee meeting in 2021. He said then, five years ago, that he supported cancelling northern gateway, and now all of a sudden, he is scratching his head saying, “Yeah, maybe we should build some major projects,” but the projects are not being built. The northern gateway pipeline that the government cancelled and the Prime Minister opposed did not get built.”
“They are the same Liberals who spent the last 11 years actively preventing Canada from diversifying its export markets by systematically preventing the construction of the energy infrastructure necessary to export Canadian energy to the world. Canadian oil and gas is by far Canada's most valuable export. It dwarfs everything else. Oil and gas exports are worth $160 billion a year. The Prime Minister said that he had the experience for this moment and assured Canadians that he would be successful in defending Canada's interests by negotiating a deal with the Americans while diversifying our trade. What has the Prime Minister done? He teased Canadians by saying it was time to get things built. He teased Canadians by claiming that his government would see that major projects would be built at speeds thought unimaginable.”
“Today, we are having a debate about the recession that the Liberals are responsible for and we demand specific actions in response. I can already hear the howls of protest from the Liberals saying things like, “What about the tariffs? What about the war in Ukraine? What about the war in Iran?” These global events affect every other economy in the world. Let me say something before I hear even more howls from the Liberals claiming, “Do the Conservatives not know that Canada is more vulnerable because we are more trade dependent on the United States than those other countries are?” They are the same Liberals who claimed that their leader would have a trade deal with the United States by summer 2025.”
“Technically, young Canadians are giving up on the dream of home ownership, and with it, the dream of starting their own families, because Canadians technically have the most unaffordable housing among peer countries. Technically, over the last 11 years, the Liberals have passed a series of laws and ministerial orders that have prevented Canada from bringing its resource wealth to world markets and provide high-paying jobs for Canadians. Technically, the Liberal finance minister would make Chrystia Freeland and Bill Morneau blush over the fire hose of new spending and federal debt that young Canadians know they are going to be on the hook for. Technically, the PBO said the finance minister misled Canadians in his budget.”
“Madam Speaker, Canada is in a recession, but the Liberals, and even some of their apologists among the punditry, say that it is only a technical recession. Allow me to get technical for a few moments. Technically, economic growth is shrinking, and that is how we measure the strength of a national economy. Technically, 40,000 more Canadians are out of work so far this year. Technically, the cost of living has left millions of Canadians unable to afford basic necessities, like food. Technically, under the Liberals, Canadian families are the most indebted in the world, which means they are tapped out, and cannot lead the way out of a recession through increased consumption.”
“Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to rise to table a petition on behalf of 556 people, mostly from Calgary, who have signed a petition calling on the government for the restoration of diplomatic relations with Venezuela. The petitioners acknowledge that there are tremendous human rights abuses that are ongoing in Venezuela and that Venezuela does not yet have free and fair elections. The lack, the absence, of diplomatic relations makes it difficult for Canadian citizens to access services and to interact with Venezuela and Venezuelans. Therefore, they call for the restoration of diplomatic relations.”
“Madam Speaker, of course we believe in Canada. We believe in Canadians. We do not believe in the Liberal government, because it is the only government in the G20 to lead its economy into a recession. This week, we also learned that the government is borrowing $72 billion this year, not $65 billion as stated in the budget. The Montreal Economic Institute said that the deficit is on track to exceed $117 billion by 2035, and that is even without new spending. Will the finance minister admit that this week's reports have destroyed whatever fiscal credibility he thinks that he might still have?”
“Madam Speaker, last Friday, we learned that under the Liberal Prime Minister , Canada is the only G20 country in a recession. Yesterday, we learned that there is only a 1% chance that their latest fiscal anchor will hold. The Liberals have, so far, refused to acknowledge their own government's reports. Will they admit today that they caused the only recession in the G20 and that they are already breaking their latest fiscal anchor, or are they going to say that it is all just a technicality?”
“He promised Canadians that he was the man for this moment of crisis, but under his leadership, Canada is in a Liberal recession. His budgets have no credibility, and it is Canadians who have to pay for it.”
“Madam Speaker, under the Liberal Prime Minister , Canada is the only G20 country in a recession. This was reported last Friday, based on Statistics Canada's negative growth data. Then, yesterday, the Parliamentary Budget Officer reported that there is only a 1% chance that the Liberal government's fiscal anchor will hold. The PBO also said that the Liberals are borrowing $72 billion this year, not $65 billion as they budgeted. Yesterday, the Montreal Economic Institute said that the deficit is on track to “hit $117 billion by 2035”, even if they do not add any new spending programs. Scotiabank and the Bank of Montreal both released dismal economic growth projections. Stats Canada also reported labour productivity is falling. The Prime Minister promised fiscal restraint. He promised competent management.”
“Mr. Speaker, it is possible because there was a change of government in 2015, and the new government blew it. It really is that simple. I mentioned some of the other advantages, from a government point of view, that the Liberals inherited from the previous government, in fact from previous governments. There was a decades-long running consensus around fiscal discipline in the House, and the Liberals blew it. They inherited, yes, what The New York Times described as the world's most prosperous middle class. This was a country where people could get ahead if they just did the work. A normal person could go to school, get a job, save a bit of money, buy a house, put down roots and start a family in a nice, safe neighbourhood. That is the country the Liberals inherited, and they blew it.”
“Mr. Speaker, if the member meant that we have called upon the federal government to eliminate all the federal taxes on fuel, he is correct that we have called upon it to do so. We are disappointed that the government has not done it. As for subsidies, we are the party of free enterprise, and if the government would simply eliminate all the regulations and laws it has passed since 2015 that prevent projects from being built, we would be much better off today. I spoke about a couple of specifics on that in my speech, but it is on the government and its red tape that is holding Canada and our industries back.”
“Mr. Speaker, there we have it again: another Liberal saying that Canadians have never had it so good. I really wonder whom the member talks to. The member raised the issue of the net worth of Canadians. I wonder if he has bothered to determine just how that average number might work out. Is it that there is an extraordinarily small number of people who have seen their assets inflate in value while the typical Canadian household is deeply in debt, getting deeper in debt and exhausting its savings just to keep up with bills?”
“The Prime Minister said that this was the time for prudent fiscal management and that as a banker he had the skills to manage the national budget. He said that he was a man for a crisis. It was all an illusion. Here we are now at a time when we are in a recession. We are the most indebted country in the G7. We have food bank usage that is off the chart. We have housing that is staggeringly unaffordable. We have the same global concerns as every other country, but we are the one that is in a recession. The responsibility for that lies on the Prime Minister , and the 10 and a half years of financial and economic mismanagement that has occurred under the Prime Minister and the government's watch.”
“Ever since then, they have been less able to cope with crises and have left us where we are today, extraordinarily in debt with a $67-billion deficit that the government just tabled and fiscal anchors that have been just cut loose. They announce one and then they abandon it. The Liberals have presided over a productivity crisis that, two full years ago, the senior deputy governor of the Bank of Canada said was a break-glass emergency. Well, the Liberals did not break the glass and deal with the emergency. They have just fumbled along right up to this very day. The Prime Minister told everybody, about 15 months ago, that he was the man for a crisis and that he was the person who would have a deal with Trump's America by July 2025.”
“The Liberal government blew it, and that was just one pipeline. There was also not yet an application, but there was an intent to build an east coast pipeline as well, and the government chased off that project when it started musing about changing, even before it put in Bill C-69 , which really nailed the door shut and made sure no pipelines would ever get produced. What the Liberal government has done is it squandered the opportunity. There were years when there was a strong world economy in the early years of the Liberal government, and the Liberals blew it. They still ran up deficits. They spent the cupboard bare in times of relative prosperity globally.”
“The Liberal government squandered the opportunity it had when it was first elected. Let us go back in time for a minute to 2015. In 2015, when the government was sworn in, it had a balanced budget and a conditionally approved pipeline to the west coast. Literally days after the government was sworn in, it cancelled the northern gateway pipeline. If that pipeline had been built, it would right now be pumping 525,000 barrels a day to world markets. Let us think of the economic activity just from that one project alone. At today's prices, that is nearly $50 million a day. Let us think of the tax revenue foregone by the government. Let us think of the paycheques that do not exist from all the jobs that would go into the production and transmission of 525,000 barrels a day at today's prices.”
“They have created a country in which one's ability to become a homeowner is really tied up in the question of whether or not their parents were homeowners and are able to share their equity with their children by refinancing their own home, lending them the money, co-signing, or all the different things. I was in the mortgage industry, and for the entire length of my career, a normal person with a normal, proper job who wanted to buy a home could save up the down payment over a period of a year or two and could come in, qualify for a mortgage and buy a home. That is simply impossible now in almost all of Canada's major cities. It is a real shame. We heard testimony to that effect at the finance committee. Our motion calls upon the government to present a plan to reverse the situation we are in.”
“The Liberals have presided over the astonishing run-up in the cost of housing that has shut out a generation of young Canadians from home ownership and traps people in rents that they are increasingly unable to afford. Rent has more than doubled under the Liberal government. Even though rents have been coming down for the last 18 months, as it has pointed out, they are still more than double what they were when the government took office. (1205) We see housing as unaffordable. The Liberals have killed the dream of home ownership for a generation of Canadians.”
“People at the lowest levels are the people getting deeper in debt. They cannot afford food. They cannot afford gasoline. They cannot afford housing. They are coping with it by exhausting any savings they might have and getting deeper into debt. Affordability is part of the crisis that we find ourselves in. With respect to housing, we call upon the government, in the motion, to acknowledge that we have the worst housing affordability in the G7. A first-time homebuyer, a young person or young family hoping to establish a new household and buy a home as part of a long-term financial plan or as a way to put down roots in a community, has not have a hope under the government.”
“They are going further into debt, and the credit balloon is continuing to expand but not with additional players. It is not that Canadians are buying homes for the first time, or this kind of thing, and becoming new participants in credit. No, indebted Canadians are getting deeper in debt. They are coping with this not with higher salaries and higher incomes to pay their debts. They are stretching out their payments, refinancing their loans, skipping out on essentials, cutting back on other expenses and exhausting their savings. This is not sustainable. This is not going to give us a consumer-led recovery, because consumers are tapped out. In fact, Food Banks Canada just released a report that says that among lower-income Canadians, food, other essentials and housing combined are more than 100% of the average household budget.”
“They talk about the trade war that we certainly do not want and did not ask for in Canada, but I point out that the United States is tariffing itself. It faces tariffs. It has made the decision to make its own citizens pay tariffs on what it imports, yet it is not in a recession. It is Canada alone among G7 countries that is in a recession, so we have to look at other factors driving this. The Conservative motion calls on the government to recognize that Canada has the worst household debt in the G7. There was devastating testimony at the finance committee about a month ago. Equifax and TransUnion, two of the businesses that track consumer debt behaviour, informed the committee that indebted Canadians are getting deeper in debt.”
“Mr. Speaker, it is always a pleasure to speak to opposition motions. Today Conservatives call on the House to recognize that the Liberal Prime Minister has given Canada the only recession in the G7. It is so sad that it has come to this and that we have to call on the House to recognize the sad fact that Canada is in a recession and is the only country in the G7 for which that is the case. Why is Canada alone in the G7? The government has blamed international events and continues to blame international factors for Canada's poor economic performance, but I point out to the House that every other G7 country faces the same international factors. The Liberals cite war in Ukraine, in the Persian Gulf and in Iran, but this affects all countries.”
“Mr. Speaker, we believe in Canadians. They can talk to CEOs. We are talking to Canadians. This Canada-only recession means that there are three unemployed Canadians for every vacant job. It means that taxes, food, housing and other essentials now account for more than 100% of an average family's income. Will this Liberal government admit today that its long-term, ongoing failure to build up Canada's economic resilience has driven Canada into the only G7 recession, apologize and implement the Conservative plan to unlock our resource wealth and make life affordable?”
“Mr. Speaker, Canada is now the only G7 country in a recession. The Prime Minister spent the last year creating new bureaucracies, racking up debt and refusing to repeal job-killing regulations. Food insecurity is up. Job losses are up. Income insecurity is up. Insolvencies are up, and housing remains unaffordable. The rest of the world faces the same outside factors that this government is blaming for its failures. Why is Canada the only G7 country in a recession?”
“Madam Speaker, members cannot mislead the House. The Conservatives never shut down Parliament. We do not have the ability to shut down Parliament. The only party that shut down Parliament was the Liberal Party when it prorogued Parliament.”
“Madam Speaker, the bill covers a lot of ground and has been debated for only about three hours. If the member thinks that is sufficient, does he believe that the House is a debating chamber where legislators debate relevant legislation with an aim to improve it, or does he believe that the chamber is merely an audience for people to clap and cheer for those things that are put before it by the current government?”
“Madam Chair, those are new ones. He has discharged and cut loose every anchor that they have assigned for themselves. What is going to be their new fiscal anchor they make up next year when this fiscal anchor is cut loose like so many before it?”
“Madam Chair, the answer is that the debt-to-GDP ratio went up, even though that is the fiscal anchor that they have been claiming for most of the last 10 years. They have broken their fiscal anchor. How much interest per household does he think Canadian families can afford for his debt?”
“Madam Chair, they have been claiming for years that there would be a declining debt-to-GDP ratio, but there is not. The debt-to-GDP ratio is rising. Is the debt-to-GDP ratio higher this year than last year, yes or no?”
“Madam Chair, Canadians are not going to learn anything tonight if the minister will not answer any questions. The interest on Canada's debt is projected to rise by 50%, from $54 billion to $81 billion, in 2030-31. Is that more than future health transfers are budgeted for?”
“Madam Chair, the minister has not answered the question. He has just repeated the same promise that they have been breaking since 2015. Canada's current interest costs for this year are $54 billion. Is that amount more or less than the current federal health transfer?”
“Madam Chair, for clarity, I am speaking for five minutes and then sharing my time with the member for Louis-Saint-Laurent—Akiawenhrahk and the member for Calgary East , for five minutes each, after I have concluded. In 2015, the minister's government promised to run modest deficits that would fund unprecedented infrastructure spending and would allow the budget to balance itself, as they put it. Instead, they created a structural deficit for 10 years, and, 10 years later, they have broken the same promise that they made back in 2015 about infrastructure. Perhaps tonight will be the night when the minister will finally answer this question and tell me in what year the budget will be balanced.”
“It is time to show Alberta that Confederation works and to convince Albertans that the best is yet to come for Alberta within this great country, Canada, that so many Albertans and I love so much.”
“Mr. Speaker, I am a fifth-generation Albertan, and I believe in the future for a strong Alberta within a united Canada. I will vote for Alberta to remain a province of Canada. However, members of the House must understand that many Albertans are angry, and I am one of them. We are angry that, since 2015, this Liberal government has made decisions and introduced laws that harm Alberta right up to this very day. Now is the time for the Prime Minister to show leadership. It is time for him to acknowledge how much harm his government has done to the unity of this country. It is time for him to show humility. It is time for contrition. It is time for action that will prove to Albertans that their federal government cares enough about Alberta to admit to its mistakes.”
“Mr. Speaker, we are debating a motion to cut off debate on a budget bill after only three hours. The minister has been asked repeatedly but has not answered the question. Does he think that three hours is a sufficient debate for the bill?”