QUESTION PERIOD — Finance
Cost of Living
April 29, 2026
Government leader, the headlines surrounding your government’s spring economic update point to a deficit that is lower than expected, and the government maintains that inflation is within target. However, the Dalhousie University Agri-Food Analytics Lab reports that one in three — that is, 34% of Canadian households — are now using financial coping strategies just to afford groceries. That speaks to a sustained pressure on food affordability that Canadians are feeling every day.
Can the leader explain why Canadians are being told that the inflation problem has been contained when families are clearly still facing acute pressure at the checkout counter? Beyond external factors, does the government accept any responsibility for domestic fiscal pressure?
Inflation has been stable for about two years now, and it’s from 1.8% to 2.25%.
However, in the spring economic update, the government proposed to accelerate over $7 billion of low-cost loans under the Apartment Construction Loan Program, to help builders move the construction of up to 16,500 new rental homes sooner and to extend the grace period of five years in order to repay home buyers’ planned withdrawal from their registered retirement saving plans. So there are many measures that are already being put into place with Budget 2025. The update increases those measures as far as housing and affordability are concerned. That is what we’re working on.
Leader, there is such a clear disconnect between the government’s economic narrative and what families are experiencing in the grocery line. At what point will the government accept that inflation within target is not the same as affordability being under control? At what point will the government acknowledge that continuing a tax-and-spend approach risks adding to those cost measures?
Let me give you the exact number on inflation, Senator Ataullahjan. It was at 8.1% in June 2022, and in February of this year, it was at 1.8%. So don’t tell us that we are not working on inflation. Now, it is at 2.4% in March despite the conflict with Iran, and most of that is solely energy-related. The difference is between 1.8% and 2.4%. So we’re working quite hard on that.
